Chapter Eight; Change
It was late afternoon, 2pm to be exact, by the time they got back to the house. Ulquiorra ignored the woman's thrashing and crashing about in the kitchen, as he continued to write things down in his journal peacefully.
"Ulquiorra! You should go take a shower!" Rude.
So much for peace.
"Why?" he asked blankly, as she poked her head in. "You haven't washed yourself since you got here, and staying clean is a good idea." At least she had some decent points. He stepped down from the small chair the woman had got for him, and waltzed up to the bathroom. Once he got there, he was immediately struck with a problem.
"Woman, give me a stool." he said in a raised tone, as he tried to reach the shower nub.
Eventually Orihime poked her hand in with a kiddie stool, and he turned the water on.
It felt nice having cold water come over his body once again. Although, not as pleasant as it was in his original body. The water didn't feel as refreshing as he began to shiver, and mumbled 'stupid gigai' and hesitantly turned the water warmer. He felt his body instantly relax as the warm water trickled down his body.
He glared at the only option for a cleaner. Lavender. He never did like the smell of lavender.
After a while in the shower, he finally got out. He dried himself off, and he noticed his kimono was gone. Well crap.
"Did you take my kimono, woman?" he said outside the door as he heard footsteps outside.
"Sorry, I decided to put it in a quick wash real quick. It's done now." He frowned.
She put the kimono in the room and he quickly got himself dressed. He used the stool to see himself in the mirror. The hollow mask was shiny from being washed and his hair was flat. He didn't bother to brush it out, and walked out of the room.
Instantly his senses were once again assaulted by burning food. He poked his head in the kitchen hesitantly and saw the woman practically juggling a baking pan with mittens towards the counter and threw it down. "What did you do this time, woman?"
She frowned. "I know you only want to call me 'woman' but you don't gotta use it at every end of a sentence…" she grumbled, putting the mittens down.
Ulquiorra ignored her complaints and watched her pick up what looked like a burnt cookie, and hesitantly take a bite out of it.
As expected, she immediately spat it out in the sink and stuck out her tongue. "I think they're burnt.." she mumbled.
"You don't say…"
Orihime giggled and dumped the rest of them in the trash, then put the dishes in the sink. "I'll do those later. I'll just order some chinese food for dinner."
"You were going to serve us cookies for dinner?"
She smiled, "Those weren't cookies silly! Those were chicken breasts!"
Ulquiorra looked at her concerningly. "I will take it as you 'edited' the recipe."
She nodded.
Eventually, Orihime left the kitchen and walked into the living room. For some reason, Ulquiorra felt obliged to follow.
As he struggled up onto the couch, he remembered what he was going to ask the woman when she woke up.
"Woman."
She looked down at him curiously.
"Do you love me?"
Orihime stared at him for a moment, and then went beat red. "W- W- What?!"
"Do you love me? I put it simple enough for you, girl."
She stared at him for a moment, flabbergasted. "W- what do you mean by that?"
"I am asking a simple question to confirm my suspicions." he said casually, as he looked at her stoically.
"S- Suspicions?" What on earth was he talking about?! Had he thought she had romantic feelings for him?!
"You revived me with your Shun Shun Rikka, and are unsure why. I believe it connects to the feeling you humans call 'love'. I am simply asking if you have that feeling towards me."
Orihime blushed and waved her hands frantically, "N- No! W-well it's not that simple Ulquiorra!"
"Is it not?"
"No! There's different kinds of love!"
Hm, Perhaps he would need to learn more about the feeling 'love' before asking about it. It seems to be far more complicated than he anticipated.
"Explain."
"W- well… it's hard to explain. There's love towards a family member, where you care for them dearly and want to protect them."
"Sexual desires for a family member? It appears I have misunderstood love."
"No! No no no no! I meant protecting them, not sexual desires!" she let out a sigh in defeat. "It's… hard to describe. Family love isn't like that at all…"
Ulquiorra raised his eyebrow.
"Then there's romantic feelings. It's where the term 'love' most commonly is known. That's where you get those tingly feelings around someone, and you want to protect them. You want to spend time with them all the time…" she let out a relaxed sigh and looked up, smiling. "...and you want to live with them forever."
"How does one know they're in romantic love?"
Orihime giggled, "Oh it's great! When you come around the person you like, you begin to feel weird! You get all tingly and sometimes sweaty, and it feels like your lungs drop into your stomach! Your heart starts to run a marathon and you get all woozy!" she giggled and smiled at the description
Ulquiorra raised his eyebrow again. "That does not sound pleasant, woman."
"Oh but it is! It's hard to make it sound pleasant without betraying how it actually feels. I'm sure you'll eventually be able to feel it for yourself, Ulquiorra."
Him feeling like he wants to spend his entire life with someone? Protecting them just for the sake of loving the person? He frowned, "Ludicrous, I cannot fall in love."
She giggled, "Yeah, ok. I'm sure you will eventually."
"Have you ever been in love, woman?"
Orihime giggled at his cluelessness on the topic, and how him asking it sounded. "Hm…" She thought for a moment, before orange hair came through her mind. She blushed and looked up. "...yeah…" she said peacefully as she thought about her dear orange haired crush.
Ulquiorra observed how her face color changed. He was unsure why, but he could guess it was connected to the description of feeling love. He didn't bother asking who because he personally didn't care.
"I really do miss talking to Kurosaki-kun…"
Ulquiorra retracted his previous thought, now he cared. "What?"
"Huh?" she suddenly sat up and looked down at him, snapping out of her love-sick daze. "Oh. Sorry." she mumbled as he looked at her with a frown.
"You have fallen in love with Kurosaki?" Orihime frowned as she realized she shouldn't have said that in front of the man who not only killed Ichigo twice, but was killed by Ichigo.
She sighed knowing she probably couldn't get out of this one, "...I have for a while."
Ulquiorra looked down, suddenly not wanting to look at her face. "I see."
He suddenly got off the couch and left the room without warning as Orihime looked at him. He walked into the dining room and sat on a chair before pulling his journal out.
He did not care about this woman, but something about her saying that triggered something in him. He began to write in his journal as the woman walked over. "You have a diary?"
And with that, his mood worsened.
"It is a journal."
She giggled and peeked over his shoulder, and he slammed it shut. He looked up at her with a "do you mind?" look as she smiled.
Suddenly she snatched the journal and held it high. Ulquiorra glared at her, "Give me that back," he said as he tried to reach for it. Orihime giggled and opened it.
"Let's see… Oooh you did like the ice cream!" she laughed as he tried to reach the book she held above her.
"Let's see… Awh the windowsill is your favorite!"
"Far from it!" he grunted as he tried to grab the book from her.
She read a few more out loud until she stopped. She read over the long paragraph.
'She triggered something today. Something in me has changed, whether that be for the better or the worse, I am yet to find out. My hollow hole indent on my gigai has weirdly been decreasing in size every moment I spend with this woman.
Perhaps she is linked to these feelings I have been experiencing over these past three days. Ever since my return to life, she has been slowly impacting my internal behaviors, not yet physical. I am unsure how long I can bare until it begins to affect my physical and emotional behaviors as well.'
Orihime closed the book slowly with an expression Ulquiorra had never seen before. What had she read? She slowly gave him back the book as he snatched it back and let out a scoff and she let a small smile grace across her face. He put the book down, as Orihime left upstairs without another word.
A few minutes later, a loud thump sounded itself next to Ulquiorra, and he nearly jumped out of his seat from the suddenness. He looked over to see a huge book with the word dictionary on it.
"What is the meaning of this woman?"
She smiled, "It's a dictionary. It can describe the emotions better than I can! Just look under the letters of the word you're looking for, and hopefully help you sort yourself out!" she beamed as she turned around, whipping her auburn hair behind her.
"Figure… myself… out?" he slowly asked as she disappeared into the kitchen
He opened the dictionary and began to scan through the words under the L category.
"Love definition is a way of describing the feeling of intense, deep affection or attraction for another person or something. Love can be expressed as a verb or a noun, and it can involve different emotions and behaviors, such as intimacy, passion, commitment, care, protectiveness, and trust. Love can also have positive and negative aspects, depending on how it is shown and received."
Ulquiorra read over it, and had to agree with the woman for once. The dictionary did make more sense.
He didn't need to look for the definition of those other words, as he knew what they meant. He may be clueless to many emotions, but not what those emotions cause. Suddenly, a loud ringing cut through the air, as he boredly turned his gaze over to the loud phone.
He stood up to answer it, but was practically trampled by Orihime who bolted over to the phone, yelling "I've got it!"
"Hello? Oh hello!" Ulquiorra raised his eyebrow at the woman knowing the person on the other side of the phone, and peeked his head around her legs to look up at her.
"Oh yeah, he's here. Right now? Like right now right now kind of right now?" He blinked a few times at that, then continued listening.
"Alright, sure. I'll be over there in thirty minutes! Byebye!" she squealed happily, then put the phone down and jumped up and down, almost crushing Ulquiorra, as he barely scrambled out of the way like a cat.
She turned down and had a wide smile on, "Ulquiorra guess what?!"
He was hoping it was his gigai, and he looked up at her nonchalantly. "What is it?"
"Ichigo is throwing a party for the lunar eclipse! And we're invited!"
Ulquiorra gained the biggest frown he'd had all day. "Is… that so…" he grumbled as he dusted off his kimono and stood up.
"Yeah! Oh my god I forgot a lunar eclipse was going to happen tonight! Oh I'm so excited! We've got an hour to get ready and go!" She beamed happily and practically bolted out of the room.
What the hell was a lunar eclipse?