Disclaim: I borrow other people's literary creations and make them do things that might just horrify their authors. In other words, they are not mine. Don't own them.

A/N:This takes place in manga chapter 51 after Ichigo invites Uryu to lunch and before Renji and Byakuya show up for Rukia. There is time there, if you squint sideways.

This was written before Reaching For the Golden Ring, but in first person. I deeply apologize if Ichigo sounds ANYTHING like Yachiru. I just wanted to tell this from his perspective because it makes it deliciously awkward and its a very nice peek inside his head before things got (more) complicated in there. And seriously, how could I resist torturing Prude!Ichigo into telling this story and watching him try to do it without actually saying anything that explicit?

~*~

I was walking. I didn't set out with any destination in mind or anywhere I had to be. I was just walking to keep from thinking. As usual, it wasn't working. I ended up thinking about Ishida of all things. Maybe it's difficult to keep from thinking about someone who had saved your life.

That it had been his stupidity that had led to the risk in the first place should be noted. Stupid Quincy. What a dumbass. Dramatic dumbass Quincy.

It was kind of funny though, we had things in common. We'd both lost people we loved to hollows. We both knew about hollows and soul reapers and quincies at all. And as much as I hated to say it, I did agree with some of his ethics.

It wasn't intentional when I found myself in front of his home. Just like I hadn't been worried about him when I'd asked a few people where he lived. And you know, completely random that I would show up in front of his house when he lived on the far side of Karakura. There is no way that I was worried enough about him to go knock on his door and check on him.

It just happened, okay?

He opened the door while half pushing up his glasses like he always did. Why does he do that, anyway? Can't he get them fixed? It drives me insane and they aren't even on my face. How can he fight that way? Even if I asked, he'd have some smart ass answer about the power of the quincy or something.

"Kurosaki, how did you get here?"

My first reaction was look half sick and smile like an idiot. I managed to recover. "I walked."

He gave me a mystified and annoyed look, still peering out at me through a crack in the door. His hands were still bandaged I noticed, curled around the door. "Well.... what do you want?"

"Um... could I come in?"

He glared at me like I'd asked to spit in his tea. "Do you have any manners at all?"

Probably not. I get asked that more often than you might think. "I just..."

"Fine. Come in." He stepped back, motioning me past him.

I took my shoes off at the door, very carefully placing them neatly next to his. See, I have some manners. Then, I was busy trying to get a look around the place without gawking like a tourist. Fail. I got as far as the dressmaking dummy and just stopped.

Ishida swept past me, head tilted so his hair and the glare on his glasses kept our gazes from meeting. "I was just going to sit down to dinner so I suppose I have no choice but to ask you to join me."

"I didn't mean to.."

He cut me off as he walked into the kitchen. "It doesn't matter. I've already told you that I prefer to eat alone." He pointed imperiously at the table. "Sit, please."

I sat on the cushion, he had pointed toward. I watched him carefully setting dishes on a tray. For a moment, I thought about offering to help him. After all, he was still sporting his mummy hands. How bad were his hands hurt anyway?

He carried the tray to the table and sat down across from me. "We're having mackerel miso stew."

I took a bowl off the tray. "Um... yum?"

"It was my grandfather's recipe."

Oh. Right. Eating. It was like when Yuzu made mom's steamed eggs. You just eat it and love it.

I tried to think of something to say as I chewed. More than that, I tried desperately not to squirm, watching Ishida painfully and slowly try to use chopsticks with his bandaged fingers. It was getting harder and harder to dislike someone when they kept doing things that were sort of cute and borderline pitiful at the same time. "Do you need any..."

He slammed his chopsticks on the table, making the dishes rattle. "Shut up, Kurosaki! I do not need your help. Not with anything. Not ever!" He was blushing a deeper red than I would have even thought possible.

Damn. I really hadn't meant to set him off that time. As if I ever really did. "Hey." I covered his balled fist with my hand. "Seems to me, I needed yours. What does the quincy code of honor have to say about that?"

For a moment, I thought that was only going to set him off more. Then with a sigh, he unclenched his hand slowly, pulling it away from mine. "I suppose it would be unfair to deny you some way to repay me."

Was that a faint smile? Did Ishida even know how to smile? What evil things could he have in mind? And why did that smile make me want to tackle him? "Oh?"

I was on the move. I hadn't made any conscious effort to move and there was no thought behind it. Suddenly, I was just on my hands and knees, halfway around the table. Somewhere after my mom had died, some school councilor had labeled me with having no impulse control. Really? I didn't think that would have come as any surprise to the quincy, as I rounded the corner of the table. I crawled over the cushion between us and up the outstretched length of his leg.

"Dishes." There was a quaver in his voice. It sounded unsure and... He started crab-walking backward away from me. We ended up nose to nose with his back pressed against the wall. "What are you doing, Kurosaki?"

What was I doing? I hadn't thought about it yet. Still wasn't going to. At that very moment, I wanted to kiss him, so I did. I wanted my mouth all over those lips that seemed frozen in some form of disapproval or other. They were softer than I expected, fuller when they weren't all pressed together. I traced the smooth curve of his lip with my tongue and he gasped.

I pulled away to look at him. His eyes were wide in shock, his hands half raised in either surrender or making an attempt to push me away. He didn't though. I guess I should have given him more of a chance to react, but it just didn't occur to me. I wanted more. Another taste might do it.

I dived right back into his mouth with mine. I knew more about what I wanted this time and I was going to get it. Uryu's shock lasted a few moments longer, but by the time my tongue brushed his, his bandaged hands clenched the shoulders of my shirt. His mouth moved with mine in a way that made it very important that more of our parts touched and got in on this action as soon as possible. That was going to be tricky with him hunched up against the wall the way he was.

That time, I pulled away from him so fast, I got a breathless, wide-eyed Ishida jerked into my lap. "What?" He sputtered and then started smacking my hands away from his shirt buttons. "Kur... Ichigo... are you insane?"

Yeah, maybe. Because in that moment, in my demented mind, I wanted every last bit of that proud, arrogant, demanding, proud Quincy. "Here's what I think, Uryu." I answered calmly, catching his hands and trying to keep them out of my way. He was stronger than he looked. It must be from all that practicing with his stupid bow. "We can just, you know, do this, and then we could consider ourselves even."

"What ever gave you the idea that I would want to... anything with you?"

I looked at him pointedly. He was still half draped over me.

He let that fact go. "And then wouldn't you be the one in my debt? I saved your life."

"Menos Grande? Came to your bait?"

His face went still and blank other than a wisp of fear drifting through his eyes. His voice was much softer as he replied. "This is not some thing."

Thing? What did he think? That I wanted to be his boyfriend? That we'd hold hands and pass notes at school? 'Hey dad, this is Uryu my boyfriend. He's the last of some arcane, nearly extinct race and we have crazy sex after we slay evil spirits together, but we're really mortal enemies.' Even my dad was not weird enough to understand that. Thing, shyeah right! "No thing.... just stuff. Stuff all right with you, Ishida?"

"I think so," his voice almost squeaked that it rose so much, not to mention he was completely out of his breath. "And you should probably just call me Uryu now, seeing your hand is down my pants."

Oh. Right. Those should be coming off as well, I decided. Then, there was a lot of frantic clothes tugging and removing. Somehow, we managed to fumble over the cushions and out of our clothes between kisses and Ishida cursing our school uniforms for having an excessive number of buttons. He is so weird.

At last, we got to nakedness and groping, hands everywhere and more enthusiastic if somewhat stylistically lacking kissing. I had him very nicely pinned down on his bed, our hips grinding together with very impressive and distracting results. I nudged his thighs apart with my knee and he went stiff-- not in the happy, good way.

"You know what you're doing right?"

"Mostly," I replied, looking around for a moment and wondering exactly how we had gotten to the bedroom. "We're going to need some lube here."

Ishida went brilliant red again and then almost sickly white. "Why would I have lube?"

Damn, didn't he even masturbate? Was even he that uptight? Maybe that was why he was so uptight, then.

"Wait!" He'd gone back to looking annoyed and unhappy. He was just so good at it. "Mostly?"

I propped myself up on an elbow. Obviously, things weren't going anywhere until we had thoroughly discussed everything to death. "I know what I'm doing, mechanics-wise and in theory. I've just never done this with... anyone."

The expressions that passed over his face where way too mixed and fleeting for me to read all of them, but the result was amazed and something softer than I was used to seeing on him. "Why? Why me?"

Aw man... now I had to think about it and try to explain. Crap. "Because you're different. You're smart, talented, funny without meaning to be and you have this annoying grace and beauty that makes me wish I could be more like you." It was my turn to blush after all that.

His eyes were wide but his voice didn't sound impressed. "You never even knew I existed before."

"Well yeah, but I do now,." Why did we have to have this discussion while we were naked and my brains weren't even at my usual not best?

"And?"

And what? "And now I know you do. I know a lot of things do that I never knew about before." I carefully pushed his glasses up his nose before he could. "And I guess that makes me appreciate the things that have always been there a lot more."

It must have been a good enough answer, because he kissed me hard enough to curl my toes and then opened the cabinet near our heads. Heh, yeah, the lube I'd asked for was there, along with a box of tissues covered in a frilly lace box cover. How very... Uryu.

Back to business, then. I got my fingers slippery and started applying the basics I'd learned from self exploration. Needless to say, it was different to apply them to someone else, one digit at a time. It took a lot more concentration too, but hey, it was more fun.

As Uryu relaxed and started moaning with my movements, I knew I was getting somewhere. Our eyes caught and locked onto each others as I knelt between his thighs. He looked as nervous as I felt, but there was kn way I was going to be the one to back down. I was pretty sure that he wouldn't either. He'd call it quincy pride or something, I was sure. Me, I was just that stubborn.

"I think..." I began slowly.

"You think?" He interrupted before I could finish my thought.

I growled softly. Why did I have to be the one that knew everything here? "I'm not sure but..."

I hooked my arms under his knees and tried to align everything like it was supposed to line up without falling over or squashing him. On the whole, sword fighting and killing hollows seemed easier and took less coordination. Somehow, I didn't think Rukia would find it all that surprising that I was as hopeless at other things as she thought I was at that. I wasn't telling her about this example and ACK, no thinking about Rukia!

I took a deep breath and pressed forward. Teeth clenched, breath held, I sure hoped I wasn't doing anything the wrong way. More than that, I hoped I wasn't actually hurting Uryu. Really, if I had to stop that that point, I was going to be the one crying.

It felt overwhelming, wonderful and amazing, yet at the same time, holding still and waiting for him to get used to the feeling was one of the most excruciating things I had ever felt in my life. His breath was shaky and almost panicked sounding, so I waited, stroking his his to distract and steady myself. Plus, could anyone really have hipbones light that? Supermodels would weep.

Then, like a switch, things fell together. Uryu relaxed with a soft groan and shifted his hips against me. I moved with him and it all suddenly seemed that much easier. We rocked together, groping and clinging together, making noises that under any other circumstance would have killed either of us in shame.

We were beyond caring about propriety in that moment, if I had ever cared about it at all. My world was consumed with the heat and friction between us, my thrusts into him and stroking him along to make sure he was right there with me,. When I thought that it couldn't last a moment longer, his muscles clenched nearly painfully around me. Just in that moment, as I realized Uryu was truly the most exotic, beautiful creature I'd ever seen, I lost all ability to do anything but experience the pure bliss of release.

When I finally because aware of anything again, I realized that he was still mostly squashed beneath me. I flopped onto my back, sprawled every which way and did a little internal high fiving and thinking WOW! as I tried to catch my breath.

Oh right, there was someone else I could be congratulating on the whole experience. Rolling my head toward him lazily, I grinned. He looked dazed and too thoughtful for what we had just finished doing. "Hey, you okay?" I asked. Damn, had it been bad?

"I'm..." He paused to sit up, dragging a blanket up to hug to his chest. "Yes, I'm okay."

It didn't sound all that sure to me. I frowned.

Then he smiled. The crinkle of his eyes, the curve of his lips, they both made my stomach flutter as I leaned up to kiss him again.

He pressed the tip of his finger against my lips, stopping me., When had he lost the bandages anyway? "But now I am sure... we shouldn't ever do this again."

"What?" Not like I had planned on it, but still!

"You're still a soul reaper. We're still different and... no matter how much this feels... too good, I can't. I couldn't live with myself as a quincy if I..." As he spoke, he'd sat cross legged in the center of the bed and wrapped himself in the blanket.

That stupid, arrogant Quincy.

"You know what?" I asked getting to my feet and collecting the various pieces of my school uniform, hurrying into it. "You're right. Like I said, we're even. ...and that's it."

Uryu nodded, fingering his glasses up the bridge of his nose. "That is what you said."

I stood with my shirt half buttoned in his doorway, wishing I had something more profound to say. "So long, Ishida Uryu."

He gazed back at me, his expression almost back to it's normal cast. "So long, Kurosaki Ichigo."

I walked out, snagging my shoes as I closed the door behind me. Back to where I started, I walked home, nearly aimlessly, trying not to think, but for a completely different set of reasons.

~*~

A/N:This was not what I set out to write, but I like it. And it does do an admirable job of explaining how Ichigo was preoccupied enough to miss Rukia's note when he got home. Then, the strangely emotional Ichigo/Uryu bit over Uryu wanting Urahara to 'take care of' Ichigo and the reaction Ichi had to it. Plus, OMG stupid boys!