The woman enjoys her pastimes. One such is something these humans foolishly call "video games".

Idiots.

Clearly there is also audio involved.

Audio that is repetitive and incessant. Audio that follows me from room to room while her eyes focus on a screen depicting a little man in a green hat and tunic as he bounces and somersaults across the landscape of a fictional world called "Hyrule".

I've been informed that the humans have come up with a much more accurate term for such audio: Ear Worms.

A better descriptor I've yet to hear. The electronic folk tunes and ocarina whistles squirm their way through my mind without permission regardless of my occupation or location. I often find myself staring into the black void of her ceiling at night, struggling not to hum the Lon Lon Ranch theme.

These cloyingly upbeat tunes are objectively annoying and exhausting. I would hate them, but the way the woman's smile lights up when she discovers a new item and the dance of her brows as they dip and bunch on her face while she faces yet another enemy she lacks the "hearts" to conquer (which I very much doubt, having been previously conquered by just her singular heart), makes a warmth settle in my chest that soothes the irritated response.

Much to my chagrin, these simple melodies have become a comforting soundtrack to my evenings.

However…

She has reached a new stage, with an almost familiar landscape as barren as Hueco Mundo but the color of the woman's cinnamon hair. It is called called Gerudo Valley. Gerudo Valley's background music is equally evocative of my former home.

"What is this trash?" I ask. I don't like it, I realize. It reminds me of what I was before. This is the soundtrack of my life before Orihime.

I prefer to imagine that my life only actually started with her.

"It's flamenco. You don't like it? Really? I love it…" she mumbles as her weight sags deeper into the sofa.

"Woman, you must understand… it sounds like—"

"I know, it sounds like Hueco Mundo. Arrancars used to play flamenco all the time there. I'm not sure who was playing, or how they obtained the guitars, but I always found it kind of funny and actually…"

She doesn't continue. I can see how she weighs the impact of her thoughts and decides that they should not be uttered.

This bothers me.

"Actually what, Woman?" I press. I can't help it. I need her to be honest with me, always. Even when it hurts.

I watch her lips twist to the side as she decides to tell me. "I used to dance to it when no one was looking."

I…

I blink. I have no words. This is not where I thought this conversation was going.

"What?" she asks self-consciously, sinking still deeper into the cushion.

I did not realize I was laughing until I saw the gobsmacked look on her face as she slowly rose out of her fiber-fill coffin.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry," I say, unable to articulate anything else as I fall prey to another shocking fit of laughter.

"Are you alright, Ulquiorra?" she asks, placing a hand on my back. The soothing action helps to dampen the explosive behavior.

"I am. However," I say to her, schooling my expression into one more characteristic, with relaxed eyes and a mostly untwitching mouth, "I demand to see it."

"See what?"

"You told me you did flamenco dancing in your cell. I must see it. Now."

"But there's no music, how can I dance--"

My hand, outstretched towards the television, and the sharp raise of my brows silence her. We both hear the repetitive electronic doo doo doo dooooo, doo doo doo dooooo, (pause) doo doo doo dooooo, doo doo doo dooooo, (pause, this time lower) doo doo doo dooooo, doo doo doo doo, trumpet sounds laid over rhythmic hand clapping, followed by plucked and strummed guitar. "Get up and show me."

Slowly she rises, clearly uncomfortable. I cannot help but savor how she squirms, it is too rare and delicious to see validation of my own frequent feelings acted out in her body, even though I rarely show them myself. "Are you sure?" she asks me.

I nod. This music will last until the end of time, unchanging, until she turns it off or has the little elf boy on the screen move to another map location.

What she does next nearly kills me. I am not famous for my humor, but by the power of Aizen, this woman is hilarious as she raises one palm up beside her head and puts the other on her belly. She rubs her belly with one hand and waves the other at the wrist as she sidesteps four times one way for eight beats, then swaps the position of her hands and sidesteps four times the other direction for another eight beats. After this, she turns in a clockwise circle for four beats and then counterclockwise for four more, still doing the same hand motion as before, then stops and pouts at me.

"What?" she whines. It's a pitiful sound and sight as her shoulders slump forward.

I bite my lip and offer her somewhat sympathetic eyes. "You are terrible." I don't just expect the truth from her, I give it back.

Her eyes narrow. Now I'm in trouble.

"Okay, fine. You do it," she demands.

I was right. I am in trouble. I don't dance.

Mostly.

Never in front of anyone.

And only recently.

It is those damn earworms! The incessant music and her dancing when she moves through the apartment without realizing it, swishing her hips and shoulders and singing songs like a little bird as she goes about her daily tasks… It's contagious.

I rise and approach. "Only if you do it with me," I state my condition as I put a palm in the center of her back and grasp her left hand. I don't dare to look away from her eyes as my feet start moving. In my mind, we are executing flawless steps, turns, and dips as I lead her around the living room table to this tune. In reality, we are probably one false step away from toppling over and bringing her brother's shrine down with us.

It doesn't matter. The look on her face is priceless as it changes slowly from surprise, to wonder, to delight, and finally exhilaration.

Just like the song that never ends in the background, I could do this just to watch her smile for the rest of time. I would, too, if the granny from the apartment downstairs didn't start banging on her ceiling below our feet with a broomstick, the muffled sounds of "What, do you have a horse up there? Keep it down, Inoue!" ruining the moment.

We stop, and I'm sure the color in her face reflects my own.

"Maybe we should take lessons at a studio," she says.