Glow

2 Overprotective

   Rukia woke up to a loud beeping. A hollow was a few blocks away. It's spiritual pressure made her feel as if it was right in front of her, and it wasn't very close by, so she could tell it was a big one.
   She quickly jumped out of her gigai  and woke Ichigo, and together they flash stepped to the location of the hollow.
   The thing's spiritual pressure was so great that it nearly knocked them over. It let out a ground shaking howl and started charging at them. Rukia suddenly got a burst of energy. She took out her zanpakuto.
   "Dance, Sode No Shirayuki. Tsugi no mai, Hakuren!" she commanded, and a huge blast of snow and ice came flying out of her sword, and the hollow's legs were frozen solid. She slashed the block of ice, and it's legs were gone. The hollow shrieked in pain.
   Rukia ran up a building, jumped off the roof, and poked a hole in it's mask with Sode no Shirayuki, but as the hollow was dying, and Rukia was still in mid air, it hit her with it's giant hand and sent her flying into the river.
   "RUKIA!!!" Ichigo screamed in horror as he watched his best friend fall to a watery death unconscious from the blow.
   He flash stepped to the high ground right above the river and jumped in to save her.
   He swam in the dark waters, desperately trying to find the small Soul Reaper.
   Just as he was about to pass out from lack of oxygen, he felt the ends of her black hair brush against his finger tips. He grabbed the strands that came a little bit past her shoulders and pulled her toward him. He popped out of the water, gasping for breath and holding Rukia in his arms.
   He got out of the water and gently laid her tiny body down on the grass. She made absolutely no movement, and that terrified him. He put his hand to her neck and felt a pulls. It was dangerously weak, but it was there. There was still time. Then he put his hand to her nose and mouth and felt no breath. The jolt of fear that tore through body was physically painful.
   He put his hands to her chest and pushed again and again but it wasn't doing any good. He breathed into her mouth a few times, and then resumed pushing.
   "Come on Rukia, breathe for me. I know you can do it. You're strong. Breath!" he said frantically. He could feel the hot tears burning his eyes threatening to roll down his cheeks.
   Just as he was about to give up and break down into tears, she started coughing, and water exploded from her mouth and rolled down her face. Ichigo let out a yelp of relief.
   "Damn it Rukia, why did you have to scare me like that?'' he said when she was done coughing up the water in her lungs and was laying on the ground trying to catch her breath.
   "If you would have helped me that wouldn't have happened, idiot."
   "That thing had some of the strongest spiritual pressure I ever felt!"
   "Ichigo, you're like ten times my side and you're stronger than me and I was able to take that thing down in less than five minutes. What the hell is wrong with you?"
   Ichigo looked shamefacedly at the ground. "Maybe I was just having a bad day."
      She sat up. "You can't just have a bad day. You're a Soul Reaper. Each day you have to fight to the best of your abilities. If I wasn't here to save your ass today you would have been killed."
   "You saved my ass!?  I did CPR on you when you weren't breathing!"
   "What's CPR?"
   "It's what I just did to get you to breathe again, stupid."
   "Give me a break Ichigo! I still don't know much about the human wor..."
   Suddenly, she started coughing.
   He put his hand on her back.
   "God, my throat hurts like hell." She said in a raspy voice.
   "Of course it does. Are you ok?"
   "Yeah, I'm fine."
   She and Ichigo stood up, but her world began to spin and she fell back down on her butt.
   He kneeled back down beside her and put his hand on her shoulder. "Do you want me to carry you home?" he asked with concern.
   "Yeah sure."
   Ichigo carried Rukia home and up to his room bridal style and started to lay her in her bed in the closet, but then decided to put her in his own bed.
   "You can sleep in my bed tonight."
    "But Ichigo, it would be weird."
   "I'm not gonna be sleeping with you or anything, I'll sleep in your closet."
   "No I'll sleep in there, you..."
   "Would you shut up and quit being so damn stubborn? Just sleep in my bet. God."
   She smiled as he laid her down.
   Ichigo decided he was hungry, and just before he left the room, she said "Thanks, Ichigo."
   "For what?"
   "You know, stupid."
   "You're welcome, midget."
   When he got back up to his room she was asleep, looking like a peaceful angel again. She slept until night, so Ichigo decided to sleep in her closet.
   Ichigo couldn't sleep that night. It wasn't because he felt chlostraphobic in the closet, or that he wasn't tired. It was because every time he closed his eyes all he saw was what could have happened that day if the CPR didn't work.
   The next morning he woke up early, gasping and sweating from a night mare of Rukia dying.
   He quietly opened the closet door and checked the time. It was 6:30, and it was just starting to get light out. He looked over at Rukia who was still asleep in his bed. He boldly walked over to where she was laying and kneeled down beside the bed and stared at her face like he did the night before, except this time it was different. All of these feelings that had been deep inside of him finally came gushing into his heart so quickly that it took his breath away. He would never tell her how he felt, or at least, he thought so.
He lingered around her more than usual for the next two weeks, trying to keep her safe. When he was eating lunch with the guys, he would stare at her the whole time she was laughing and talking with the girls. He knew deep down that she was perfectly safe, and every time he would just start to realize that, the memory of her laying in the grass not breathing brought back that fear.
One morning, Ichigo woke up to Rukia, who was already in her school uniform, shaking him harshly, yelling for him to wake up. She threatened to leave without him, and that was what brought him to full consciousness. Something could happen to her if she left alone.
"Hold on. Don't go."
He tried to put on his uniform as fast as he could, but it wasn't fast enough for her, so she jumped out the window.
Weird, he mused, she hasn't taken the window in a while.
When he was ready, he ran as fast as he could to catch up with her, and she was in his sight just in time to see her trip over a rock and tumble backwards.
"Rukia!", he yelled, "Are you Ok?!"
She sat up and held her bloody elbow. "I'm fine Ichigo!"
He ran to her and helped her stand up.
"I'm sorry. I should have watched you closer." he said with guilt.
Suddenly, she was pissed.
"What the hell Ichigo! Ever since that day by the river you've been so protective of me. I can tolerate you looking at me, but not you following me around like some lost puppy. You're being ridiculous! These things happen, and you just have to move on. And you know I've almost died many other times since we met, so,what's got you so worked up this time?!"
"Because those times you didn't stop breathing. I was never so scared in my whole life, Rukia."
Rukia took a small step back and was silent. Could the possibility of her dying scare him that much? Was she really that important to him?
"I just can't afford to lose you." he whispered, looking down at his feet. His heart started beating rapidly. He was feeling exactly like he did the night he went over to where she was sleeping and stared at her face. All of these feelings came all at once again. Love. Protection. Worship. Need. Lust. They came flowing into him like a rushing river, but at the same time, like a gentle stream. It felt wonderful and terrifying and beautiful. Should he really say it? This was Rukia! How could he possibly feel this way about someone who he was annoyed at about 80% of the time?
"I love you." he said it.
Rukia stepped back even further. "What?"
"I said I love you, Rukia!"
Her eyes went wide for a few seconds, then went back to normal. Her heart melted at the desperation of his words and the truth of his words in his amber eyes. She stepped closer to him and kissed him on the lips. "I love you too, Ichigo."
He pulled her body to his and they made out in the middle of the side walk.