Ichigo paused for a moment to get his bearings and to think of the quickest way to get to school. "Hey wait a minute..." He looked down at himself and then angrily pulled Kon from his pocket. "Argh!! That is just freakin' nasty!!!" he yelled at the pill. "I REALLY don't want to know when you get turned-on in my body!!!"
Mura sailed through the day on a cloud of happiness. Even the taunts of her classmates shattered against this new-found shield. I can't believe that he wants to see me again so soon. And the way he saved me from...from well whatever it was...he did save me. I could stay in his arms forever. She dreamily looked down at the what she was drawing and smiled when she realized that it was Ichigo's face. When school was over she practically ran to her car, so much was her excitement to see Ichigo again.
That afternoon Ichigo snuck into Yuzu's room and grabbed the freshly laundered and beribboned lion from her shelf. He took it back into his room and sat on his bed clutching it tight. He pulled the pill from his pocket and shoved it into the plushie's mouth.
"Hey! Long time no see, Ichigo!" Kon yelled up at him.
"Now listen here and listen carefully. I need to know one thing only." Ichigo told Kon holding him in a death grip to prevent him from escaping. "Which cafe is it that you met Mura at?"
"Now Ichigo, I really think that we can strike up some kind of a deal here...don't you? Do you really have to go and ruin my chances of ever getting any and break some poor girl's heart?" Kon whined back at him.
"You are only going to be in this body for one more minute. Either tell which one it was or don't and I'll figure it out. If you don't tell me though I won't put you back in any body for the next year! That will be enough time for you both to cool off!"
"It's three doors down for Urahara's store," Kon mumbled. "Now will you let me go?"
Ichigo smiled and said, "No." He reached back into the lion's mouth and pulled Kon's soul out.
"Trust me Kon, it's best for everyone this way," Ichigo said as he placed him in his pencil jar. On his way out he replaced the plushie back on Yuzu's shelf.
Mura looked around for Ichigo when she got inside the cafe. When she didn't see him she asked for the table closest to the counter. She was half-way through her bowl of soup when he appeared. She instantly noticed that there was something off about him. For one thing he wasn't smiling his bright and sunny grin, in fact he was scowling and looked quite crabby. When his eyes met hers they didn't light up like they had before and her heart sunk. He quickly strode over to her table and sat down, clearly ill at ease.
"Uh...Mura?" he asked her.
Her eyes widened a little at the sound of his voice. It was clearly different than it had been before and not just because he sounded like he was pissed at the world.
"Yeah?" Mura was barely able to squeak out. She nervously tore at her napkin.
"I...a...I'm sorry I lead you on like this. It was bad of me. I can't see you any more though...ever," Ichigo told her and then quickly got up to leave.
Mura caught his sleeve and he turned back to her. "Why?" she asked him, tears streaming down her cheeks.
Ichigo shifted uncomfortably and said, "I can't really tell you why...you just can't, OK? Oh God, don't start crying on me." He pulled away from her grip and quickly strode from the restaurant.
When he was back in his room he looked at the pill sitting in the bottom of his jar and said, "Geez. Don't make me have to do that again for you, Kon. It was way too hard." He looked at it a moment longer and said, "I can't be the bad guy any longer. Can I trust you not to pull the stunt you did this morning ever again?" His mind made up he grabbed the pill and took it into Yuzu's room where he replaced it back into the lion.
Once back inside Kon just slumped on the shelf. "Is it over?" he asked Ichigo.
"Yeah." Ichigo mumbled back. Suddenly Kon stood up and ran towards the door of the room. "Hey! Where are you going?" he yelled after him.
"Well even if I can't have a relationship with Mura, I still want to see her!" Kon yelled behind him as he left the room.
Mura sat in her booth until it was full dark outside and she knew she couldn't linger any longer. Then she slowly got up and left the cafe. Once she was outside she walked over and sat on the bench. It was going to take her longer than she had thought to feel well enough to drive back home. At first she was too lost in her own thoughts to notice anything around her, but when she turned to look down the street her breath caught in her throat in surprise. The plushie lion was back on the bench where he was the last time she saw him. "Are you lost again?" she asked it. "I feel really lost right now...almost like these past few days have been a dream. You don't mind if I tell you do you...I have no one else to tell," she said as she pulled the stuffed lion into her lap.
"You see I met the most wonderful person in the world, but even in the beginning I could tell there was something weird about him. Of course that just endeared me to him all the more. He was so quirky and different, unlike anyone I had ever met before. He seemed so sure of himself even when he looked a little silly." Mura laughed softy to herself and didn't notice the plushie slightly shifting at that statement in her lap. "But the more I think about it, the more I think I had an encounter with a ghost. I mean there were so many weird things that were happening around him sometimes. I don't know how else to explain it." She sighed and then continued, "And then tonight when I saw him again in the cafe, it wasn't him at all, and yet the person I saw in the cafe tonight seem to be the real person and the one I had met before the imposter. Yet I liked the imposter a LOT better," she smiled to herself. "Yes I must have been falling in love with a ghost...I don't know how else to explain it."
I AM a ghost aren't I? Bodiless, formless...no place to go unless someone is kind enough to put me somewhere. Kon silently thought to himself. A tear slipped from his eye and fell down his cheek.
"You know what? I do feel better after talking to you. Strange," Mura told the plushie turning him over to face her. "Hey, what's this?" she asked herself noticing the wetness on it's cheek. She shivered as the first dropplets of rain fell on arms. "Ah, yes...just the rain then. I shouldn't leave you out here in the rain though. Here, let me put you back in the cafe were you'll stay dry. Maybe you'll still be there tomorrow, huh?" Mura asked as she took the lion back into the cafe. She left it in her booth nestled in the corner and then left the restaurant.
Kon watched her go.
The End