And just like that, he had left.

Orihime stood, clutching her school bag, peering out of the window that first Rukia and then Ichigo had evacuated since prior to now, thinking hard.

What had possibly gone wrong?

There she had been, talking with Ichigo and perhaps even getting further invites back to his house, his room... to be in a close proximity to him again...

And then Rukia had appeared. The first emotion that had rushed through Orihime was surprise and happiness after finally seeing her friend after so long; but that had been doused insanely quickly by an intense feeling of loathing. Why, oh why did she have to come interrupt then? When she had been so close to taking another step forwards? Rukia always pulled her back...

When she realised what she was actually contemplating, Orihime jumped a little, and shook her head, bringing her hands up to her mouth. What was she thinking?! Rukia should always be first and foremost, her friend.

But nothing could change the very obvious jealousy and loathing she had of her appeal to Ichigo. Just when Orihime had been getting so much closer. It wasn't fair.

Her eyes shut in despair, she was a terrible person. No one should think of their friends like this, least of all her, who had made a silent pact to herself years before... about being grateful for all her friends, given that she'd grown up without any.

There was a slight disruption in her inner turmoil however, as she realised she didn't know where her two friends went and why. Thinking back, she could remember clearly Rukia's horrified face. Had one of them said something insensitive? She'd never seen Rukia's determination-set face ever look so defeated and shocked.

Wracking her brains, she settled on one sentence she did remember speaking.

"When we slept together?"

A blush crept up her neck and flooded her cheeks and her eyes widened in embarrassment. Could Rukia have interpreted that the wrong way? It was possible, if she hadn't heard the context. In fact, there hadn't been any context. Oh no.

And yet still in the midst of her despair and embarrassment, one thought managed to take over within her.

Maybe it was a good thing that Rukia had heard that.

As wicked as it seemed, Rukia assuming the game was over could play into her hands and favour her quite nicely.

That being said... would she be able to allow Rukia to suffer that much pain? She'd just thought of how she would've felt if she'd overheard something similar between Ichigo and Rukia. To know her love was unrequited. To know she had lost, and there was no use for her.

It truly was terrible.

There was no way she was evil enough to allow her friend to experience all that.

This was too much; she felt torn. As a person, Orihime was very much a morally-based individual. She couldn't bare doing anything wrong, her conscience was harsh. And feeling this way about Rukia was morally wrong; especially how she was supposed to be one of her best friends.

But there was her innermost desires, too. Orihime knew that something inside of her was making her feel this way, and because of the loathing and jealousy and all the negative unfamiliar feelings she had been getting recently, she was ready to blame it all on an inner Hollow.

But if this was all a Hollow's fault, how come falling in love with Ichigo felt so... right? She knew she was in love with him, and she felt so compatible to him that it all being the fault of a demon seemed to just not be right. It had to be real love. And love was more powerful than morals.

Or was it?

In any case; she should never want to hurt either of them. Case closed.

She opened her eyes determinedly. That was enough thinking despicably about her friends, right now her priority should be finding them, not plotting how to make everything work for her and no one else.

And she stepped out of the window, to follow suit.