Something like this doesn't normally happen. Quite like this, anyway. Sometimes Ishida-kun would help her up after a fall, or his hand would hover over the center of her back for support, but -- rarely does she get the chance to do the same for him. Returning the favor was never a viable option. He simply wasn't the falling type.
So, because something like this doesn't normally happen, Orihime would never have expected how difficult it'd be to keep him propped upright. Ishida-kun was tall, taller than her (obviously, yes, but it was never really such a problem like it suddenly was now), and although she never gave it much thought before, it was an oddly startling, peculiar observation that she didn't quite know what to do with. He protested, she insisted -- Ishida-kun, we'll fall if you don't coordinate this with me.
She didn't have to. He slumped a little, and she stopped pondering on how best to move forward when his weight pressed onto her, not heavy per se, but simply there. He sagged against her, and Orihime very nearly toppled from the suddenness of it, from the view of his face filtering in through her peripheral.
Did he always look so tired?
"... Ishida-kun," she breathed. Half of it came out as a sigh while the other half was hitched, restrained, as if she were doing them both a kindness, sparing themselves from the harshness of the reality by pretending she wasn't as affected as she really was.
He started squirming again, and her eyes closed, her shoulders dropped; her fingers, however, remained closed tightly around his wrist.
"If maybe is the best you can do, then... Alright," she replied, willing herself to loosen the hard grip she had on his wrist, finger by finger. "I won't ask for more than that." She already knew anyway, that it was probably too much to ask for, to pry into; and she thought of Kurosaki-kun, wondered if things would've turned out differently had she forced the answer out of him the day she'd gone to his house.
Then again, it turned out alright in the end, didn't it? "... Just let me know when you're ready, okay?" She turned her head and smiled at him, dropping her hand from his wrist and straightening her posture. Her other arm moved from his upper back, lowered to brace the small of it with her hand. "I want Ishida-kun to tell me on his own, then."
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So, because something like this doesn't normally happen, Orihime would never have expected how difficult it'd be to keep him propped upright. Ishida-kun was tall, taller than her (obviously, yes, but it was never really such a problem like it suddenly was now), and although she never gave it much thought before, it was an oddly startling, peculiar observation that she didn't quite know what to do with. He protested, she insisted -- Ishida-kun, we'll fall if you don't coordinate this with me.
She didn't have to. He slumped a little, and she stopped pondering on how best to move forward when his weight pressed onto her, not heavy per se, but simply there. He sagged against her, and Orihime very nearly toppled from the suddenness of it, from the view of his face filtering in through her peripheral.
Did he always look so tired?
"... Ishida-kun," she breathed. Half of it came out as a sigh while the other half was hitched, restrained, as if she were doing them both a kindness, sparing themselves from the harshness of the reality by pretending she wasn't as affected as she really was.
He started squirming again, and her eyes closed, her shoulders dropped; her fingers, however, remained closed tightly around his wrist.
"If maybe is the best you can do, then... Alright," she replied, willing herself to loosen the hard grip she had on his wrist, finger by finger. "I won't ask for more than that." She already knew anyway, that it was probably too much to ask for, to pry into; and she thought of Kurosaki-kun, wondered if things would've turned out differently had she forced the answer out of him the day she'd gone to his house.
Then again, it turned out alright in the end, didn't it? "... Just let me know when you're ready, okay?" She turned her head and smiled at him, dropping her hand from his wrist and straightening her posture. Her other arm moved from his upper back, lowered to brace the small of it with her hand. "I want Ishida-kun to tell me on his own, then."