Disclaimer: Tite Kubo is still the legal owner of all things related to Bleach. MantaRae is a mere lowly fanfic author that has no hope of buying copyrights or trademarks. She also doesn't own anything related to any of Dr. Seuss's classics.

He woke up late that morning, forgot his bag and had to run back to grab it. This helped in making him rush even more. Stumbling into school, tripping into the classroom, Ichigo finally collapsed into his seat.

Ochi-sensei snapped a book closed with a harsh sound, "so glad you decided to grace us with your presence, Kurosaki."

Ichigo huffed and turned his head sharply away, muttering, "sorry."

The teacher looked down her nose at the perpetually scowling teen, humming in contemplation. The majority of the other students fidgeted under the suddenly tense atmosphere, the thought 'what is she gonna do?' dominating the room.

"Ah well, let's get back to work," Ochi-sensei shrugged and returned to her lesson.

Sweatdrops appeared, 'she really didn't care to begin with?'

Numbers and letters were copied as Ichigo focused on the math lesson. Rukia leaned over and dropped a thin strip of paper on his desk. When he looked at her with confusion, the shinigami whispered, "Don't worry, I got you an idiom."

Ichigo Kurosaki deadpanned and slowly turned back to writing mathematical formulas. The substitute shinigami's prevailing thought? 'Oh...joy...' with plenty of sarcasm to spare.

Then the realization hit: Rukia Kuchiki had another idiom. Ichigo was instantly paranoid even though she was calmly sitting, concentrating on scribbling algebraic expressions. Unfortunately this meant his wariness and anxiety increased by the minute. An eternity later, lunch break arrived and the teen quickly herded Rukia to the rooftop. Concerned the rest of their friends followed right behind.

Purple eyes blink in the sudden sunlight, Rukia turned to her companion, "Okay, what's going on?"

Ichigo agitated answered, "your idiom. What was it?"

After a moment of intense staring like she's wondering if he's crazy, Rukia replied, "'In for a penny, in for a pound,' why?"

Ichigo sighed in relief, "Okay, good. That one means, 'if you take a gamble, then you might as well go the whole way and take all the risks.'"

"I know."

"Huh?"

The door opened admitting the strange clique to circle around, rapid fire questions peppering the death god duo, "what is it?" "what's wrong? "I'm not saving Soul Society again."

Ichigo glanced at the last speaker, "What?! No one asked you to!"

The quincy shrugged nonchalantly, "the way the two of you bolted, I assumed that there was some kind of emergency."

"Ichigo wanted to know what English assignment I picked this morning," Rukia calmly assured, "But I already know what the penny-idiom means because Ishida helped me decipher it."

"He did?"

"Of course," Ishida replied, "Kuchiki might be adequately equipped in reading and writing English but she lacks the interpretation skills many others are proficient in."

Ichigo stumped, responded, "oh...I see."

Then he wandered over to the fence and sat down tiredly. Fugitive glances were passed through the group and an unspoken consensus was reached. They joined the orange haired teen and their typical lunchtime conversation involving many different topics flowed.

Rukia perched by the substitute shinigami, "here."

He accepted the extra bento box from her, "why didn't you or Pop wake me up this morning?"

"Your dad busted down your door," she daintily ate her meal, "but then he came downstairs and said you were 'dead to the world.' He said since you don't usually sleep past your alarm (and his training) he would allow you to rest up. He even sent a note saying you were not feeling well."

A sword calloused hand rubbed orange spikes sheepishly, "you mean I could have skipped school?"

"Yep," Rukia chirped then curiously asked, "Oh I almost forgot. What was your idiom-thing today?"

"Hm?" Ichigo dug his out of a pocket, "says 'a fool and his money are easily parted.'"

And that is when Rukia Kuchiki formed a plan. She hatched a dastardly, evil plan.

"Well that's perfect for you because you are a fool," Rukia commented.

"Shut up," Ichigo answered simply.

Rukia's eyes glinted with mischief and she silently snickered at her brilliantly formed plot.

As Ichigo trudged home with the short one humming happily at his side, his suspicious query, "what are you up to?"

"About 1000 yen, I hope."

"What are you talking about?"

She whipped out a wallet and opened it, peeking inside, cheering, "Oh, there's more than that!"

Ichigo stared at the bold thief, "you took my wallet?!"

"You were right," she smirked, "a fool and his money are easily parted."

"I told you not to take those things literally. And stop stealing my stuff!" He tried to snatch his wallet from her greedy grasp.

"I didn't take your idiom literally. I took your wallet because I could," she smiled evilly, "And because it was fun."

Ichigo glowered, "That's your reason?"

Rukia shrugged and threw his wallet into the air, "In for a penny, in for a pound. I knew you'd complain so I figured I might as well make some money while I was at it."

He caught the now empty wallet, yelling incredulous, "Hey! Stop stealing my stuff!"

A cursing irate teen chased the cackling shinigami-thief to the Kurosaki Clinic, where he was warmly greeted by an overjoyed flying tackle. As Ichigo was a bit distracted attempting to grab the short death god, this resulted in the son being body slammed into the sidewalk by his own father. Rukia escaped the writhing-in-pain substitute shinigami's wrath and revenge...for now.

A/N: Thanks everybody that reads, reviews, favorites and follows. I am eternally grateful. Hope y'all enjoyed this installment of Idioms. It has a lot of physical and monetary pain for our favorite ginger substitute. I kinda paraphrased a couple lines from 'How the Grinch stole Christmas' by Dr. Seuss. I'm still disclaiming that author's copyrighted works, related trademarks and such.