A/N: Ta-dah! I hope you like it… :)

The Bakery

Chapter 2

This time, Ichigo was in the front room of the shop, cleaning the sticky handprints off the glass counter. There was a primary school field trip nearby, and they'd just bought all of his strawberry tarts. That flavour happened to be his specialty. Along with cleaning him out of his most popular food, those kids had also touched the glass so much that it was no longer see-through.

He was very annoyed at that.

But having to shut the shop for cleaning wasn't all bad; it gave him time to think. His bad mood that day had originally been because he'd somehow managed to get the girl of his dreams to hate him. That would put a damper on the wedding. He sighed unhappily. After meeting her just once—and only talking to her for five minutes at most—he had somehow managed to fall completely in love with her.

What on earth will I do after the second meeting? he thought cynically.

But there would be no second meeting.

Because she hates me.

He sighed again, resigned to his depression, going back to his vigorous scrubbing of the counter. He heard the bell on the door ring. "We're closed," he said, without looking up. He expected the person, whoever it was, to apologise and walk out again, but they didn't. She coughed quietly to get his attention. He looked at her.

"I owe you three dollars," she said.

It was Kuchiki Rukia.

"Ah!" was his first reaction, jumping back in shock and accidentally tossing the sponge he was using behind him.

"What?" she said, surprised by his sudden shout. "Do I have something on me?" She looked over her arms and body, quite possibly searching for some huge bug or the like.

"No, no. I was just surprised to see you." Ichigo was also surprised by the fact he could talk in a relatively normal way to her. After beating himself up so much for his idiocy yesterday, he had managed to take control of himself so he wouldn't do the same thing again—in theory, at least. He had to make things better, and he was determined to do so. "About yesterday, I'm really sorry about the way I acted," he said quickly, not giving himself a chance to mess it up.

"Uh, yeah. What was that all about anyway?" she asked.

"Well, I guess I was surprised to see you in my little shop since you're so famous," he said. It wasn't really lying; he had been surprised. But he thought it might be a bit too much to confess his deep love for her, so he used that as an excuse.

"Oh, yeah. I get that a lot." She sighed. For some reason she felt perfectly at home with this strange baker. Like how the sun and the moon are at peace with each other; the perfect balance.

"So I'm forgiven?" Ichigo asked, just to be sure.

Rukia nodded, then stopped. "Only if you let me pay for yesterday's bread properly," she bargained.

"What?" Ichigo said, confused.

"You know, yesterday, you told me it was one dollar for the bread. It wasn't; it was four," Rukia explained, hoping he wasn't going back into his creepy daze.

Ichigo blinked. "Oh. Whoops," he said. "Don't worry about it." He was trying to be nice, but Rukia shook her head. She came up to the counter, smiling, leaned over it, and put something in his shirt pocket. It was exactly like yesterday, minus the grabbing him by the collar. He took the three dollars out of his pocket.

"There. Now, what's your specialty?" she asked, unintentionally charming him. He forced himself to stay concentrated, and he managed to do so with a kind face.

"Strawberry tarts are… But I'm all out—sorry," he said apologetically.

"That's okay." She smiled. "I can wait."

Ichigo couldn't believe what was happening. Not only did she come back, she was acting cute, and nice, and sweet. And she was willing to wait for him to make tarts that she'd never tasted before. He swallowed his nervousness and asked, "Would you like to come and watch?"

She frowned. "Am I allowed?" she asked doubtfully.

"Well, of course!" Ichigo said encouragingly. "I can't very well leave you alone out here. People might think you've broken into my shop," he joked.

Rukia still seemed a bit reluctant to follow him. He realised with a jolt of surprise that she didn't trust him. He supposed he couldn't blame her; with the way he'd acted yesterday, anyone would be against walking into a dark room alone with him.

"Fine," she finally agreed, stepping around the counter and standing next to him, but not meeting his eyes. He was surprised at her height—or lack thereof. Seeing her close up like this really made him see how absolutely tiny she was.

"Follow me, midget," he laughed, walking into the baking room. Rukia stepped on his foot—hard. He didn't dare insult her again.

They spent the afternoon baking together. She wasn't particularly skilled in the kitchen but she tried her best and managed to make two decent-looking—or at least edible—meat pies. Ichigo was a more accomplished baker—it was his bakery, after all—so he made a squadron of strawberry tarts. They then sat together in the chairs by the front window of the shop, talking and eating his tarts.

"Here." Rukia gave Ichigo one of her meat pies. He raised an eyebrow.

"I can make my own, you know," he said.

She poked her tongue out at him. "Just eat it, strawberry."

He smiled. "Fine then, midget." He proceeded to eat the pie as instructed. "So what are you gonna do with the other one?" he asked, except it came out as more of a jumbled sound because his mouth was full. It wasn't actually so bad, once you got over the out-of-place sweet taste. He wondered what exactly she'd put in it.

Rukia managed to define the words and answered, "My brother." She stopped eating and froze. She quickly snatched up her cell phone and checked the time. "Shit, he's gonna be out looking for me." She got up and put the wrapped-up leftover meat pie in her handbag, all the while muttering to herself, "I'm late. I'm so late. He's gonna kill me. He really is."

Ichigo just sat there, shocked. She picked up her bag, ready to go, and then noticed his expression. "What?" she asked.

"You swore," he managed to blurt out.

"Oh… sorry." She blushed.

"I just… I know now that you're not all sparkles and bunnies," he said incredulously. He was liking this girl more and more each minute.

"I'm sorry," she repeated. "Actually, I don't usually swear. Ever. I suppose, because I just feel so comfortable around you, it just slipped out," she explained, blushing an even deeper shade of pink.

Ichigo had an odd feeling floating around his stomach. Either her cooking was poisonous or he was reacting to her statement, 'because I just feel so comfortable around you.' He could be wrong, but in his books, words like that meant that the person liked you. And not just liked, but like liked.

"Rukia…" He had become so close to this girl over the course of just one afternoon. It had to be fate.

"Y—yeah, Ichigo?" she stuttered, tangling her fingers together.

He stood up and put his hands on hers. She stopped fiddling and looked up at him. His eyes burned like the sun and melted hers. He leaned down, and she didn't resist as he slowly pressed his lips to hers.

The kiss didn't last long; Ichigo was afraid of frightening her away, so he pulled back after a few seconds. Rukia was far from frightened; she was positively glowing with happiness. Ichigo smiled again, glad at her reaction.

They simply looked at each other for a while, before Rukia broke the connection.

"Now, I've really gotta go," she said, turning around and leaving the shop. She caught the door before it shut and called back to him, "But I'll be back tomorrow and there's nothing you can do about it!"

True to her word, she entered the bakery for the third time the next day.

A/N: Chapter 2 is done! Yay! Now, there's gonna be another chapter, but I still don't know if I will write another one after that. To write a chapter 4 or not to write a chapter 4… That is the question.
Forgive me if I'm wrong, but I think my beta-reader is also glowing with happiness right about now. ^_^

BR/N: Why, yes, your beta reader is, in fact, glowing with happiness right now. ^^
And she will be glowing with even more happiness if a certain best friend of hers decides to write that fourth chapter of a particular story she adores so much. *hint, hint, nudge, nudge*