The Sun and the Moon

Chapter 10

"Oh, stop crying, will you, Yuzu!"

Ichigo opened his eyes slowly, his pupils readjusting themselves to the bright lights overhead. His body felt like a lump of lead, and there was a dull throbbing in his head. "I'm, Karin, but…" he heard his younger sister's weeping voice somewhere to his left.

"Look, Yuzu! Ichi-nii's awake!"

Ichigo turned his head to his right, and he was immediately greeted his other sister's smiling face. "Are you all right, Ichi-nii?" Karin asked happily, while Ichigo saw that to his left her twin gave a loud strangled sob and threw her arms around him.

"I'm okay, Yuzu, Karin," Ichigo reassured them, patting a sobbing Yuzu's head gently. Yuzu released her hold on her brother and dabbed her tear-streaked face sheepishly. Scrutinising his surroundings, Ichigo realized he was in a hospital ward, causing the events of his last memory came flooding back to him.

"The hospital! The patients, Hidemi—"

His first impulse was to get up from the bed, which he immediately regretted as he experienced physical agony like he never had before, the whole left side of his body protesting at the abrupt motion. He let escape a yelp of pain and a few choice swear words before he could hold back his tongue. Karin motioned him back to his bed admonishingly.

"Your patients are fine, Ichi-nii."

"But—"

"You stay put, Onii-chan. You're injured and in no favourable position to do anything anyway," Yuzu told him off sternly. Ichigo lay back on his bed defeatedly, the threatening looks on his younger sisters' faces told him there was no point arguing. But he remembered Hidemi, the girl who was with him when the Hollow attacked.

"There was a girl, Hidemi with me. Is she all right?"

At that instant, two familiar figures entered his room, the relief and gratitude etched on their faces answering his question. A crying Fujiyama-san grabbed Ichigo's right hand and planted a sloppy kiss on it, the gesture tainting his cheeks crimson.

"Oh, Kurosaki-sensei! You truly are our daughter's saviour! We owe our Hidemi's life to you!" the older woman wailed, tears of gratitude falling in quick succession down her face. Ichigo looked around at his sisters for help, but Karin simply looked amused while Yuzu seemed bewildered by the events.

"Ano… Fujiyama-san, it was nothing…"

"Nothing? You are our hero, Kurosaki-sensei!"

Ichigo looked helplessly at the man standing behind his wife. The balding man gave Ichigo a look of gratitude. "Fujiyama-san, is Hidemi all right?"

The man nodded quietly, but he added, "Hidemi was unscathed, thanks to you. But she keeps insisting that a dark-haired lady in kimono saved her life, how absurd is that? I'm afraid my daughter might have been traumatized by the event…"

The female Fujiyama gave another loud wail. Karin regarded her brother suspiciously, but Ichigo looked away. So, he had been right after all. He had not been imagining things. Hidemi saw her too – Ichigo barely had time to be surprised about the girl's ability to sense spirits – thus he had definitely not imagined her either. But there remained questions in his mind.

Karin opened her mouth to ask Ichigo a question; he knew very well what the question was. But before she could speak, a doctor entered the room.

"Visiting hours are over, everyone out."

"Oyaji!"

Kurosaki Isshin stared back blankly at his son's half-smiling, half-scowling face. Upon hearing Ichigo's reaction and realizing that the dark-haired man in a pristine white coat was the father of their daughter's savior, the Fujiyamas profusely expressed their gratitude at having borne "such a wonderful son!" to which Isshin responded in his usual eccentric manner, giggling in a manner found highly disturbing by his son, as he said "indeed, where would my idiotic son be without his father!"

The edge of Ichigo's lips twitched in disgust as he held back his urge to throw a punch to his old man's face right there and then in front of the Fujiyamas. Beside him, Karin rolled her eyes and scoffed, while Yuzu laughed nervously at their father's behavior.

Finally, the Fujiyamas were dealt with, and after they left Ichigo found himself for the first time in a few months alone with his whole family in the same room. The jovial, almost comical expression on his father's face melted into a serious one as he checked through Ichigo's patient profile folder.

"Oyaji, why are you doing the rounds here?"

Isshin scribbled something on the folder, then replied without looking up at his son, "Most of the patients from Kagamino had been sent over here at Karakura General Hospital for treatment. It's overflowing with patients here now; they would need all the help they can get. The more critical patients had been sent to neighbouring town hospitals in the prefecture."

The older man finally closed the folder shut and turned to his own daughters. "Yuzu, Karin, help me bring your brother safely back to our house. Someone else needs this bed badly."

Ichigo got up in protest. "Back home? I'm not going back home, Oyaji! I'm staying here to help—"

"To help out? In your condition?" Isshin asked him, with a look that rarely ever grazed the older man's features, the kind that parents use to tell their children there is no further discussion on the matter. "You'll be more of a hindrance than help here."

"But still, you said it yourself, Karakura is understaffed!"

Isshin ignored his son's objections and gave instructions to his daughters to make sure their brother got home, even if they had to do it by force. Finally, the older Kurosaki turned to regard Ichigo again. "Perhaps next time you will learn not to play the hero when you obviously don't have the power." And with that, Isshin disappeared into the hospital corridors.

Don't have the power…? How did he…?

Before he could contemplate further the loaded words his father spoke, Karin broke through his thoughts.

"Ichi-nii, time to go."

Ichigo looked out of the window. To his right, handsome houses and neatly-pruned trees whizzed past like a movie film as the car drove through the streets of Karakura. "Ichi-nii, how's your leg doing?" came a feminine voice from in front of the driver's seat.

To be quite honest, Ichigo's injured leg which was hoisted up on the back seat was now numb from lack of blood circulation, but he decided not to be too honest because he was getting quite tired with his sisters fussing over every of his need. "I'm all right over here," he lied, pulling down the car window and placing his uninjured arm on the ledge, enjoying the feeling of the wind against his face.

His sisters seemed to have developed a habit of ignoring his responses to their questions of concern, for Yuzu replied cheerfully, "It's okay, Ichi-nii, we'll be there soon!"

Ichigo continued to observe the sights and sounds of his hometown. Of course he knew they were approaching his childhood home. He might not have visited the town in quite a few years, but he would never forget the memories this place held for him. And for that same reason, he had subconsciously avoided living in the town if he could help it, ever since he returned from Soul Society a decade ago.

Soon the familiar buildings of the Karakura High School came into view. Seeing the place again reminded Ichigo of his old classmates like Keigo and Mizuiro. He still had correspondence with the two of them, but as they always say, one can never take back again the wonderful times in school.

The car rounded a bend and finally, Ichigo saw the sign "Kurosaki Clinic" and the quaint house that stood behind it. "Home sweet home!" Karin said as she got off the vehicle to help the injured Ichigo out.

It was a strange feeling, being back in your old home in which you grew up in but no longer inhabit. It was like seeing an old friend, the memories of time spent together came flooding back, which quite often brought back feelings of nostalgia that make one's heart flutter in reminiscence. But along with it came an uncomfortable indescribable strange feeling, like you are stuck in the past but your friend had moved on to the present without you.

Finally, after the twins had helped him with much difficulty from the car to the door, Yuzu opened the door and Ichigo plopped himself unceremoniously on the living room sofa with a huge sigh of relief. "Yuzu, Karin, arigatou—"

"Ichi-nii, if you thank us one more time I will poison your dinner," Yuzu said sweetly before disappearing into the kitchen. Ichigo stared after her in shock. "Has someone abducted our Yuzu, Karin?"

To this Karin merely chuckled, saying, "Ah, I think that's Otou-san's crazy genes finally expressing themselves."

Ichigo laughed. Inspecting the house, he realized that not much had changed at all during his almost decade-long absence from it. Hardly any furniture had been rearranged, his father had not had the patience to consider renovation ("why would I want to change the house's design when your mother decided on it?" he exclaimed), everything in the house was exactly how he remembered as when he left for medical school. But his eye focused immediately on the most eye-catching feature of the house which often attracted the attention of visitors first, and he realized this was the only thing that was different from his old memory of the house – the mandatory huge poster of his beautiful mother now showed a post-adolescent Masaki winking at the observer in what Ichigo guessed was a failed attempt at being sultry.

When Karin walked back into the living room carrying her brother's old clothes, she found him staring at the offending poster with a look of indignant incredulity and disgust. She had to laugh out loud.

"What the hell is that, Karin?" her brother asked, pointing at the poster.

Karin rolled her eyes. "Oh please, Ichi-nii, Otou-san had been changing that poster every month for a while now. Trust me, that one isn't the worst we've seen."

When Ichigo finally diverted his gaze away from the disturbing picture of his mother to his sister, he found Karin folding a pile of old clothes in front of him. "Sorry, Ichi-nii. You've got to use your old clothes for now. Yasu-chan—" the dark-haired girl turned bright pink at her slip of the tongue, "Ano… Sado-kun will be taking your clothes from your apartment today."

Ichigo's lips curved into a small smile. His good friend had been dating Karin for almost six years now. "So, how's Yasu-chan nowadays?"

He thought his sister could not possibly get any redder, but she did. "He's fine," she replied, concentrating intently on the shirt she was folding, which Ichigo noticed she had refolded about three times already. "Ano… Ichi-nii… Actually there's something I've been wanting to tell you for a while now."

Ichigo hoisted his injured left leg onto the sofa and gave a grunt.

"Ano… eto… Ichi-nii, Sado-kun, he… eto… He asked me to… ano… to marry him…"

Ichigo stared at his sister in surprise. The girl was observing him intently with a nervous expression on her face. Her fingers fiddled nervously on the sleeves of his folded shirt. "Sou ka?"

Karin gave a small nod. Ichigo closed his eyes. "And what did you say?"

"I… ano… I told him I had to ask Otou-san and you first…"

Ichigo opened his eyes again, this time letting his gaze rest on his mother's fresh young billboard face as he thought about the times when Sado, his nakama, had been there for Karin when Ichigo himself could not be there for her. Karin searched the expression on her brother's eyes. She did not think he would take it too badly, she had even reassured Chad of his approval before she decided to inform her brother, but now she was starting to think she might have assumed wrongly, but for what reasons she knew not.

"Can you… live without him, Karin?"

Karin stared bewilderedly at her older brother, not quite getting the meaning behind his question. Did he mean that he was asking her if she could live without Chad, because he did not approve of them getting married?

"Ano… I think so, Ichi-nii. But…"

He brother continued to look at something else, seemingly deep in thought. "And what did Oyaji say?"

"He was ecstatic, of course, you know how he gets all jumpy when it comes to Sado-kun."

"Sou ka?"

There was a moment of apprehensive silence between the two siblings, and at that time Karin knew then that her older brother would disapprove of it. His reasoning would probably be along the lines of it would be dangerous to be his wife because Sado seemed to invite trouble naturally, or something completely ridiculous like—

"All right then, I see no other reason why you shouldn't marry him."

Karin looked up at her brother in wide-eyed disbelief. "Really? Really, Onii-chan?"

"I can't think of another man who would be more than willing to get bullied by you." Ichigo gave his sister a smirk, which then earned him a big unexpected hug from the girl. "Oi!"

"Yuzu, did you hear that!" Karin shouted to the kitchen. Yuzu emerged from the kitchen beaming, and the two twin sisters shrieked simultaneously in joy and started hugging each other, jumping up and down and doing some weird dance.

Ichigo stared at his two sisters rejoicing as if they were once again ten-year-olds whom Ichigo promised to take to the zoo because their father was busy in the clinic. Catching a glimpse of the offending poster of his mother on the other side of the room, Ichigo was positively sure that he was the only one left in his family who was not insane.