Every Journey Always Brings Me Back To You (3/?)
Title: Every Journey Always Brings Me Back To You
Author: Ragna (afteriwake)
Pairing: Ishida-centric (overall; this part is Orihime-centric) with mentions of past Ichigo/Orihime and current Ishida & OFC friendship. Eventual Ishida/Orihime.
Rating: PG
Spoilers (if applicable): Set after the Lost Substitute Shinigami arc but before the new one that just started.
Warnings (if applicable): None
Summary: He had moved on, but when it came to her, he’d still do anything for her, even while he’s an ocean away.
Authors Notes: Ishida’s not in this part because I wanted to elaborate on Leigh some more, and thought it might be nice to see Orihime open up to another female other than Tatsuki (though Tatsuki will be back soon). He’ll be in the next part, though!
---
Orihime woke up the next morning to humming. She had found Leigh’s pull-out sofa to be very comfortable, though when she first woke up she freaked out a little about not being on her futon. She didn’t open her eyes, listening. She recognized the song, because it was one of the themes to an anime she watched weekly, or had until a few months before. Before she realized it, she was singing along. The humming stopped, and for a moment she faltered, until Leigh picked up the song lyrics in flawless Japanese. Orihime sat up and they finished the song before they both started to laugh.
“Enjoy your sleep?” she asked in Japanese.
“Hai. This is a very comfortable bed to sleep on,” Orihime replied before stretching.
“I thought you might want to borrow the mat I have for when my older sister visits, but Uryu said you’d probably like the sofa bed more.”
“I sleep on a futon at home,” she said, peeling back the covers and putting her feet on the carpeted floor. “Is it still raining?”
“Pouring down rain,” Leigh said, pointing to the window with the spoon in her hands.
“Oh,” she replied with a frown.
“It’s supposed to stop this afternoon. I don’t think we’ll have a pretty sunset today. But tomorrow we’ll go to the beach. I think OB has a better place to watch than PB, though we could go all the way to Oceanside and go to the pier there,” she said. She caught the confused look on her face and shook her head. “I’m sorry. OB is Ocean Beach and PB is Pacific Beach. Oceanside is a town up in the north part of the county, next to the military base. They’re all nice cities, though really aimed at tourists.”
“Ah,” she said.
“We’ll probably go to all those places anyway. I heard about some problems in OB that Uryu wants to take a look at, and it can’t wait until after you leave. And PB and Oceanside are just fun to visit, especially since we’ll probably take the Coaster up to Oceanside. It’s a long trip, almost as long as driving, but it’s an experience.”
“That sounds like fun,” Orihime said with a smile, standing up.
“I’m making apple cinnamon pancakes, if you want to try some,” she replied. “If not, I have cereal. There’s also rice and tankatsu left over from last night. Sorry there’s no steamed veggies. I got hungry at four in the morning when I got back from the hunt.”
“I didn’t even notice you were gone,” Orihime said, surprised.
“It’s because it was just me and I was quiet,” she said with a chuckle, going back to the counter and adding more to the batter. “I’m sneaky like a mouse.”
Orihime giggled. “I thought cats were sneaky.”
“They are, but mice are quieter.” Orihime joined her in the kitchen, where Leigh was adding some cinnamon to the batter. “I really like to cook, if you haven’t noticed. I go to a culinary school in downtown San Diego.”
“I thought you went to school with Ishida-kun,” she asked.
“I did, when we first met. But after a semester I realized that being in a huge university just wasn’t for me, you know? One of my friends at work told me about the culinary school and I talked to them and found myself getting really excited for it, so I dropped out and enrolled in the other school. I just started a few weeks ago.”
“No one likes my cooking. I make weird things.” She had a sad smile. “My…ex-boyfriend…would sometimes eat what I made. Ishida-kun did, too, when we went to school together. But I think they were just being polite.”
“If we don’t go out to eat very much I can teach you how to make some of my favorite foods,” she said, setting the bowl down. “Uryu tells me you’re a fast learner.”
“I am,” she said with a nod.
“Then I can give you cooking lessons. And we’ll start now. I’ll teach you how to make the perfect pancake.” She showed Orihime how to do everything, step by step, and even let Orihime make half the batch. Orihime’s pancakes didn’t turn out as round as Leigh’s, and they were a little crispier around the edges, but they still tasted good, and the two of them dug in as soon as the last one was cooked.
“You’re a very good friend,” Orihime said after swallowing her last mouthful of pancake, taking her plate to the sink and beginning to do the dishes.
“Thanks. But you don’t have to do that,” she said.
“I should, though. It’s only fair,” she replied with a smile before going back to the dishes.
“So what do you want to do today? My classes got cancelled for the week since my professor is out of town, so while Uryu’s in class it’s just you and me. He’s going to play hooky next week, but he had tests in all his classes this week.”
“We could talk.”
“Do you drink coffee?” she asked. Orihime nodded. “I used to work in a coffee shop in New York. I’ll make some good coffee while you put the sofa back, okay?”
“Okay,” Orihime said, continuing on the dishes as Leigh went to brewing the coffee. It took about ten minutes, but by the time they both were done Orihime was sitting at the table and Leigh was giving her a cup of coffee. “There’s a heart in the foam!”
“I thought you’d like that.”
“What kind of coffee is it?”
“It’s a caramel macchiato,” she said. She set down her coffee and used some of the whipped cream she’d had in her other hand to top it off. “Do you want some of this?”
“Yes, please.” Leigh squirted some whipped cream on top of Orihime’s coffee, and then went back into the kitchen briefly to get the cinnamon, sprinkling a little on both coffees. “I’m a coffee addict. I’m using it and food to get rid of the nicotine habit.”
“How long have you been smoking?”
“Since I was sixteen,” she said. “I just turned nineteen last month.”
“Ah,” she replied. “I’m still eighteen.” She took a sip of her coffee, and a contented smile sat on her face. “I used to work at a bakery. There was a coffee shop next door, and I’d take one of our cupcakes and have a mocha in the mornings before school if I had time.”
“I thought you said you weren’t a good cook,” she replied.
“Well, baking is something different, isn’t it?” Orihime said. “I didn’t do much baking, though. But I am good at it.”
“I’m not that good at it. Every time I try and make bread from scratch the inside is doughy.”
“I can make very good bread!” Orihime said. “I can teach you how to make bread, in exchange for your cooking lessons.”
“Deal,” Leigh said, leaning forward and reaching her hand across the table. Orihime grasped it and they shook once. “That’s the part I’ve been dreading, the baking. If I get some lessons in, maybe I’ll do all right.”
“I can make a few things from scratch I’ll just make them without my special additions.” She took another sip of her coffee. “How is Ishida-kun doing? I know he’s worried about me, but…other than that?”
“He’s tired a lot of the time,” she replied truthfully. “It’s not the course work, but the hunting. He goes all over this part of the county to hunt, not just this city. Sometimes we’re out until sunrise, and then he goes to class. I think he runs on batteries sometimes.”
Orihime giggled. “Before I got to know him very well, I kind of thought so, too.”
“He’s a good friend,” Leigh said, taking a sip of her own coffee. “He really was going to go back to Japan if you hadn’t agreed to come out here, just to see how you were.”
“I don’t doubt that,” she said. “He’s gone a long way for me before.”
“He told me about that. Hueco Mundo, right?”
“Hai,” she said with a nod. “It was a horrible place. I felt helpless and alone. Then…Ichigo…found me, then got hurt, and then he was there, on the dome, trying to protect me, too.”
“Ichigo’s the ex?” Leigh asked, and Orihime nodded. “Uryu said you usually called him Kurosaki-kun. He always referred to him as Kurosaki, though I think he used his whole name once.”
“He had told me to call him by his first name when we started dating,” she said quietly. “I was so excited, because it meant we were close, you know? And he called me Orihime. It was what I’d wanted for such a long time.” Her voice hitched, and she shut her eyes, taking a deep steadying breath. She took another after that, and then she opened her eyes again. “I was a fool to think he cared about me more.”
“Love will make you do foolish things, but it doesn’t make you a fool,” Leigh said. “You were simply blinded by love, that’s all. God, if I knew you better I’d get up and give you a hug right now. You look like you could really use one.”
“No one’s really hugged me since him,” she said. “Ishida-kun did at the airport, and it felt nice.”
“Yeah, he never struck me as a hugging person,” Leigh replied with an amused grin. “We show our affection for each other by punching each other in the shoulder. I started it, before you think he got all violent while he was out here. Usually we use sarcasm as out major form of affection.”
“When he used sarcasm with Ichigo it was not meant to be friendly,” she said. “He must have changed a lot since he’s been here.”
“I think he is that way with me because that’s just the way I am. He’ll adapt to behaving in a way that is most comfortable with the person he’s with. Just watching him with you showed me he is very still and serene, and ready to listen when you want to talk.” Leigh took a sip of coffee. “He’s a good man. My parents were highly disappointed that I wasn’t going to marry him.”
“Are you seeing anyone right now?” she asked.
“No, not really. It’s hard to do what I do and date. I was seeing someone for a little bit, but she couldn’t see spirits and got really jealous that I spent so much time with Uryu. She kept accusing me of being bisexual, which I very much am not.” She chuckled slightly. “She threw a cup of grape juice in his face when we broke up. He’s the only person I know who can get grape juice stains out of white clothing.”
“He was in his Quincy uniform?” she asked.
“No, he was in a white button down shirt and slacks. He’d come back from an interview about a scholarship. This was about…four months ago. He dresses down a lot more now, but when he’s hunting, out comes the uniform.”
“I was so used to seeing him look dressy,” she said.
“It took months to get him into shorts,” she said. “We had a heat wave where the temperatures were in the 90s as early as nine o’clock in the morning and he nearly passed out because he was wearing a suit to impress…somebody, I forgot who. Something about a professor, I think. Anyway, I brought him here, gave him ice water and forced him into my brother’s tank top and shorts. Ever since, he’s had no problem wearing the style, but only when it’s hot.”
“I hope I get to see it,” she said. “I think it will be good to get used to these new changes in him.”
“Yeah, probably. I think some of them may even be permanent.” She took another sip of her coffee. “Can I ask you a personal question?”
“All right, but only if I may ask one.”
“Sure,” Leigh said with a nod. “Your ex. How well did you know him? Not intimately, I mean, but…in general.”
“I thought I knew him very well,” she said after thinking a moment. “I knew what he liked and disliked, I knew he was good to his family and he tried to be good to me, he was a good student…he was very…good. Very loyal and very brave. And he is, still, but he is also hurtful without realizing it. When he makes a decision he does it without waiting, without hearing others opinions sometimes. Like when he came to rescue me. Soul Society…has Ishida-kun told you about it?”
“Enough that I get the general idea,” she said with a nod.
“They were planning a battle, but Ichigo came and rescued me and almost ruined it. People died because Soul Society wasn’t able to stop…” She shut her eyes and took a deep breath. “Aizen. They couldn’t stop him from coming into the real world. I’m thankful he rescued me, but so many bad things happened because he didn’t wait.” She opened her eyes, and they looked sad. “That’s the kind of person he is. He’ll save the day in the end, but usually not without some sort of cost.”
“It seems you put a lot of thought into how he is.”
She gave a slightly bitter laugh. “I shut myself off from people. I had nothing but time on my hands to think. I was starting to come out of it when Ishida-kun asked me to come visit. I think this will help a lot.” Then she took a sip of coffee. “Now it’s my turn.”
“Go for it.”
“How did you tell your parents you weren’t interested in men? I know Honsho-san’s parents always kind of knew, so she just said she was a lesbian and they were accepting of it.”
“I yelled,” she said. “My mother had pulled me into the kitchen to talk about what a sweet boy Uryu was, and how I should snatch him up quick. She’d been making comments like that the entire week, and I’d finally had enough. I said ‘I don’t like men, okay? I like women!’ and she dropped the plate she was holding.” She paused. “This was about three months ago, and my mother just started talking to me again last week. My father was supportive, though. Like your friends parents, he always kind of knew.” She smiled. “I think he finally convinced my mother that it was okay. It also helped that my older sister came back from Tokyo with a fiancée. She works there, and has invited the whole family to her wedding in three months. At least now she knows the family line will continue.”
“Do you ever want children?” she asked.
“Yeah, I think I do,” she said with a smile. “Just not right now. What about you?”
“Someday, I would like to be married and have at least one child,” she said with a fond smile.
“It’ll probably happen faster for you than for me,” Leigh said with a laugh. “Any guy would be lucky to have you.”
“You really think so?” Orihime asked.
“Just from listening to Uryu talk about you I knew, but after getting to know you better I definitely know it’s true,” she said.
“Thank you,” she said with a blush.
“Hey, I have an idea,” she said, grinning. “There’s a place that shows old movies. Think your English is good enough to enjoy one of the classics?”
“You may have to explain some things about American culture, but I should be okay.”
“Then let’s go see a movie, and I’ll treat you to something to eat afterwards. It’ll be another four hours before he’s out of class, and I think we’ll get bored here.”
“All right, that sounds fun,” Orihime said with a smile.
“Great!” Leigh said. “Let’s finish our coffee before they get any colder.”
Orihime smiled back. She was thankful that Ishida-kun had a friend like her, and she hoped that maybe at the end of her stay, Shinoda-san would be her friend, too.
Author: Ragna (afteriwake)
Pairing: Ishida-centric (overall; this part is Orihime-centric) with mentions of past Ichigo/Orihime and current Ishida & OFC friendship. Eventual Ishida/Orihime.
Rating: PG
Spoilers (if applicable): Set after the Lost Substitute Shinigami arc but before the new one that just started.
Warnings (if applicable): None
Summary: He had moved on, but when it came to her, he’d still do anything for her, even while he’s an ocean away.
Authors Notes: Ishida’s not in this part because I wanted to elaborate on Leigh some more, and thought it might be nice to see Orihime open up to another female other than Tatsuki (though Tatsuki will be back soon). He’ll be in the next part, though!
---
Orihime woke up the next morning to humming. She had found Leigh’s pull-out sofa to be very comfortable, though when she first woke up she freaked out a little about not being on her futon. She didn’t open her eyes, listening. She recognized the song, because it was one of the themes to an anime she watched weekly, or had until a few months before. Before she realized it, she was singing along. The humming stopped, and for a moment she faltered, until Leigh picked up the song lyrics in flawless Japanese. Orihime sat up and they finished the song before they both started to laugh.
“Enjoy your sleep?” she asked in Japanese.
“Hai. This is a very comfortable bed to sleep on,” Orihime replied before stretching.
“I thought you might want to borrow the mat I have for when my older sister visits, but Uryu said you’d probably like the sofa bed more.”
“I sleep on a futon at home,” she said, peeling back the covers and putting her feet on the carpeted floor. “Is it still raining?”
“Pouring down rain,” Leigh said, pointing to the window with the spoon in her hands.
“Oh,” she replied with a frown.
“It’s supposed to stop this afternoon. I don’t think we’ll have a pretty sunset today. But tomorrow we’ll go to the beach. I think OB has a better place to watch than PB, though we could go all the way to Oceanside and go to the pier there,” she said. She caught the confused look on her face and shook her head. “I’m sorry. OB is Ocean Beach and PB is Pacific Beach. Oceanside is a town up in the north part of the county, next to the military base. They’re all nice cities, though really aimed at tourists.”
“Ah,” she said.
“We’ll probably go to all those places anyway. I heard about some problems in OB that Uryu wants to take a look at, and it can’t wait until after you leave. And PB and Oceanside are just fun to visit, especially since we’ll probably take the Coaster up to Oceanside. It’s a long trip, almost as long as driving, but it’s an experience.”
“That sounds like fun,” Orihime said with a smile, standing up.
“I’m making apple cinnamon pancakes, if you want to try some,” she replied. “If not, I have cereal. There’s also rice and tankatsu left over from last night. Sorry there’s no steamed veggies. I got hungry at four in the morning when I got back from the hunt.”
“I didn’t even notice you were gone,” Orihime said, surprised.
“It’s because it was just me and I was quiet,” she said with a chuckle, going back to the counter and adding more to the batter. “I’m sneaky like a mouse.”
Orihime giggled. “I thought cats were sneaky.”
“They are, but mice are quieter.” Orihime joined her in the kitchen, where Leigh was adding some cinnamon to the batter. “I really like to cook, if you haven’t noticed. I go to a culinary school in downtown San Diego.”
“I thought you went to school with Ishida-kun,” she asked.
“I did, when we first met. But after a semester I realized that being in a huge university just wasn’t for me, you know? One of my friends at work told me about the culinary school and I talked to them and found myself getting really excited for it, so I dropped out and enrolled in the other school. I just started a few weeks ago.”
“No one likes my cooking. I make weird things.” She had a sad smile. “My…ex-boyfriend…would sometimes eat what I made. Ishida-kun did, too, when we went to school together. But I think they were just being polite.”
“If we don’t go out to eat very much I can teach you how to make some of my favorite foods,” she said, setting the bowl down. “Uryu tells me you’re a fast learner.”
“I am,” she said with a nod.
“Then I can give you cooking lessons. And we’ll start now. I’ll teach you how to make the perfect pancake.” She showed Orihime how to do everything, step by step, and even let Orihime make half the batch. Orihime’s pancakes didn’t turn out as round as Leigh’s, and they were a little crispier around the edges, but they still tasted good, and the two of them dug in as soon as the last one was cooked.
“You’re a very good friend,” Orihime said after swallowing her last mouthful of pancake, taking her plate to the sink and beginning to do the dishes.
“Thanks. But you don’t have to do that,” she said.
“I should, though. It’s only fair,” she replied with a smile before going back to the dishes.
“So what do you want to do today? My classes got cancelled for the week since my professor is out of town, so while Uryu’s in class it’s just you and me. He’s going to play hooky next week, but he had tests in all his classes this week.”
“We could talk.”
“Do you drink coffee?” she asked. Orihime nodded. “I used to work in a coffee shop in New York. I’ll make some good coffee while you put the sofa back, okay?”
“Okay,” Orihime said, continuing on the dishes as Leigh went to brewing the coffee. It took about ten minutes, but by the time they both were done Orihime was sitting at the table and Leigh was giving her a cup of coffee. “There’s a heart in the foam!”
“I thought you’d like that.”
“What kind of coffee is it?”
“It’s a caramel macchiato,” she said. She set down her coffee and used some of the whipped cream she’d had in her other hand to top it off. “Do you want some of this?”
“Yes, please.” Leigh squirted some whipped cream on top of Orihime’s coffee, and then went back into the kitchen briefly to get the cinnamon, sprinkling a little on both coffees. “I’m a coffee addict. I’m using it and food to get rid of the nicotine habit.”
“How long have you been smoking?”
“Since I was sixteen,” she said. “I just turned nineteen last month.”
“Ah,” she replied. “I’m still eighteen.” She took a sip of her coffee, and a contented smile sat on her face. “I used to work at a bakery. There was a coffee shop next door, and I’d take one of our cupcakes and have a mocha in the mornings before school if I had time.”
“I thought you said you weren’t a good cook,” she replied.
“Well, baking is something different, isn’t it?” Orihime said. “I didn’t do much baking, though. But I am good at it.”
“I’m not that good at it. Every time I try and make bread from scratch the inside is doughy.”
“I can make very good bread!” Orihime said. “I can teach you how to make bread, in exchange for your cooking lessons.”
“Deal,” Leigh said, leaning forward and reaching her hand across the table. Orihime grasped it and they shook once. “That’s the part I’ve been dreading, the baking. If I get some lessons in, maybe I’ll do all right.”
“I can make a few things from scratch I’ll just make them without my special additions.” She took another sip of her coffee. “How is Ishida-kun doing? I know he’s worried about me, but…other than that?”
“He’s tired a lot of the time,” she replied truthfully. “It’s not the course work, but the hunting. He goes all over this part of the county to hunt, not just this city. Sometimes we’re out until sunrise, and then he goes to class. I think he runs on batteries sometimes.”
Orihime giggled. “Before I got to know him very well, I kind of thought so, too.”
“He’s a good friend,” Leigh said, taking a sip of her own coffee. “He really was going to go back to Japan if you hadn’t agreed to come out here, just to see how you were.”
“I don’t doubt that,” she said. “He’s gone a long way for me before.”
“He told me about that. Hueco Mundo, right?”
“Hai,” she said with a nod. “It was a horrible place. I felt helpless and alone. Then…Ichigo…found me, then got hurt, and then he was there, on the dome, trying to protect me, too.”
“Ichigo’s the ex?” Leigh asked, and Orihime nodded. “Uryu said you usually called him Kurosaki-kun. He always referred to him as Kurosaki, though I think he used his whole name once.”
“He had told me to call him by his first name when we started dating,” she said quietly. “I was so excited, because it meant we were close, you know? And he called me Orihime. It was what I’d wanted for such a long time.” Her voice hitched, and she shut her eyes, taking a deep steadying breath. She took another after that, and then she opened her eyes again. “I was a fool to think he cared about me more.”
“Love will make you do foolish things, but it doesn’t make you a fool,” Leigh said. “You were simply blinded by love, that’s all. God, if I knew you better I’d get up and give you a hug right now. You look like you could really use one.”
“No one’s really hugged me since him,” she said. “Ishida-kun did at the airport, and it felt nice.”
“Yeah, he never struck me as a hugging person,” Leigh replied with an amused grin. “We show our affection for each other by punching each other in the shoulder. I started it, before you think he got all violent while he was out here. Usually we use sarcasm as out major form of affection.”
“When he used sarcasm with Ichigo it was not meant to be friendly,” she said. “He must have changed a lot since he’s been here.”
“I think he is that way with me because that’s just the way I am. He’ll adapt to behaving in a way that is most comfortable with the person he’s with. Just watching him with you showed me he is very still and serene, and ready to listen when you want to talk.” Leigh took a sip of coffee. “He’s a good man. My parents were highly disappointed that I wasn’t going to marry him.”
“Are you seeing anyone right now?” she asked.
“No, not really. It’s hard to do what I do and date. I was seeing someone for a little bit, but she couldn’t see spirits and got really jealous that I spent so much time with Uryu. She kept accusing me of being bisexual, which I very much am not.” She chuckled slightly. “She threw a cup of grape juice in his face when we broke up. He’s the only person I know who can get grape juice stains out of white clothing.”
“He was in his Quincy uniform?” she asked.
“No, he was in a white button down shirt and slacks. He’d come back from an interview about a scholarship. This was about…four months ago. He dresses down a lot more now, but when he’s hunting, out comes the uniform.”
“I was so used to seeing him look dressy,” she said.
“It took months to get him into shorts,” she said. “We had a heat wave where the temperatures were in the 90s as early as nine o’clock in the morning and he nearly passed out because he was wearing a suit to impress…somebody, I forgot who. Something about a professor, I think. Anyway, I brought him here, gave him ice water and forced him into my brother’s tank top and shorts. Ever since, he’s had no problem wearing the style, but only when it’s hot.”
“I hope I get to see it,” she said. “I think it will be good to get used to these new changes in him.”
“Yeah, probably. I think some of them may even be permanent.” She took another sip of her coffee. “Can I ask you a personal question?”
“All right, but only if I may ask one.”
“Sure,” Leigh said with a nod. “Your ex. How well did you know him? Not intimately, I mean, but…in general.”
“I thought I knew him very well,” she said after thinking a moment. “I knew what he liked and disliked, I knew he was good to his family and he tried to be good to me, he was a good student…he was very…good. Very loyal and very brave. And he is, still, but he is also hurtful without realizing it. When he makes a decision he does it without waiting, without hearing others opinions sometimes. Like when he came to rescue me. Soul Society…has Ishida-kun told you about it?”
“Enough that I get the general idea,” she said with a nod.
“They were planning a battle, but Ichigo came and rescued me and almost ruined it. People died because Soul Society wasn’t able to stop…” She shut her eyes and took a deep breath. “Aizen. They couldn’t stop him from coming into the real world. I’m thankful he rescued me, but so many bad things happened because he didn’t wait.” She opened her eyes, and they looked sad. “That’s the kind of person he is. He’ll save the day in the end, but usually not without some sort of cost.”
“It seems you put a lot of thought into how he is.”
She gave a slightly bitter laugh. “I shut myself off from people. I had nothing but time on my hands to think. I was starting to come out of it when Ishida-kun asked me to come visit. I think this will help a lot.” Then she took a sip of coffee. “Now it’s my turn.”
“Go for it.”
“How did you tell your parents you weren’t interested in men? I know Honsho-san’s parents always kind of knew, so she just said she was a lesbian and they were accepting of it.”
“I yelled,” she said. “My mother had pulled me into the kitchen to talk about what a sweet boy Uryu was, and how I should snatch him up quick. She’d been making comments like that the entire week, and I’d finally had enough. I said ‘I don’t like men, okay? I like women!’ and she dropped the plate she was holding.” She paused. “This was about three months ago, and my mother just started talking to me again last week. My father was supportive, though. Like your friends parents, he always kind of knew.” She smiled. “I think he finally convinced my mother that it was okay. It also helped that my older sister came back from Tokyo with a fiancée. She works there, and has invited the whole family to her wedding in three months. At least now she knows the family line will continue.”
“Do you ever want children?” she asked.
“Yeah, I think I do,” she said with a smile. “Just not right now. What about you?”
“Someday, I would like to be married and have at least one child,” she said with a fond smile.
“It’ll probably happen faster for you than for me,” Leigh said with a laugh. “Any guy would be lucky to have you.”
“You really think so?” Orihime asked.
“Just from listening to Uryu talk about you I knew, but after getting to know you better I definitely know it’s true,” she said.
“Thank you,” she said with a blush.
“Hey, I have an idea,” she said, grinning. “There’s a place that shows old movies. Think your English is good enough to enjoy one of the classics?”
“You may have to explain some things about American culture, but I should be okay.”
“Then let’s go see a movie, and I’ll treat you to something to eat afterwards. It’ll be another four hours before he’s out of class, and I think we’ll get bored here.”
“All right, that sounds fun,” Orihime said with a smile.
“Great!” Leigh said. “Let’s finish our coffee before they get any colder.”
Orihime smiled back. She was thankful that Ishida-kun had a friend like her, and she hoped that maybe at the end of her stay, Shinoda-san would be her friend, too.