SO this was really long in the making, but I've finally polished it off and decided to post it. It was originally going to be around five or so chapters long, but I've condensed it some, so expect three, though it's hard to tell with how carried away I get at times.

Anyway!

Warnings! Not a happy story. It's a horror/tragedy for a reason. No major character death, but minor death and plenty of written and eluded to violence.

Enjoy~

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Hypnagogia - the experience of the transitional states to and from sleep; the state between wakefulness and sleeping.

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The neighborhood was nice, kind of uppity. It was one of those places where all the houses looked almost exactly the same and white picket fences lined the drives. The shrubbery and landscaping was neat, clean and well maintained. Mailboxes announced addresses near the streets and either a special keycard or express permission was needed to enter the edition. Before filling out an application to take over the lease of one of the houses, the potential members of the community had to prove their pay grade was high enough. When parked, the cars of visitors and residents were expected to be kept off the streets, either in the garage or driveway. They all had to be clean, rust-free and beyond average.

Upon entering the expensive housing edition, if you pulled through the main gates where a doorman of sorts monitored local traffic and kept watch for anything unsavory, a winding road lined with intricately decorated street lamps snaked clear around the neighborhood. Turning right on the second to last side street, a quiet little house sat clear at the end of the drive.

Like all the others, the front was made of brick and the driveway was paved. The lawn was well taken care of and green. The siding and brick was clean, the windows immaculate. It looked no different from all the others in this particular edition.

But looks could be deceiving.

The house wasn't huge, but it wasn't small either. It was warm, the interior decorated invitingly with welcoming colors and clean appliances. Thick, plush carpet and well maintained, expensive furniture made for a comfortable atmosphere. A man sat on the couch, a beer in hand as he propped his feet up on the wood-framed, glass coffee table before him. A tie hung loose around his neck and the button up he wore was wrinkled. On the flat screen hanging on the wall he faced, a football game played, the whistles from the referees and screams of fans permeating the otherwise quiet room.

Those sounds drifted through the speakers of the surround sound and into the kitchen, where a younger man stood quietly, a baking spatula in hand. Baking, or cooking in general, wasn't exactly something he did on a regular basis, but it wasn't hard to follow the directions on the box and it just so happened that today was a special occasion. Kind of.

The tile was smooth and clean beneath his bare feet. The window above the sink to his right let the slowly fading rays of evening light bathe the room in a golden glow. Freshly baked, the sweet smells of chocolate cake and vanilla frosting added to the friendly feeling of the house.

In the other room, the crowd from the game booed as more whistles were blown. An angry mutter from the older man in the sitting room had the younger one in the kitchen flinching as he worked. When it was clear the elder wasn't getting up, the boy continued, slowly, carefully spreading a thick, even layer of frosting on the birthday cake's top.

Tugging at the hem of his shirt, the young man crossed the kitchen, quietly setting the spatula in the sink after he was done. As he turned back toward the cake he'd nearly finished, the front door was pulled open as his foster mother finally arrived home after work.

She sniffed quietly, inhaling the inviting smells, and hummed an appreciative sound. "You're baking? What did you make?" She questioned, her tone not necessarily hostile, but not exactly soft and loving either. She'd no doubt had a hard day at work and was ready to relax for the evening.

"A cake." Her foster son said, his voice a deep but quiet rumble. He didn't bother looking at her, keeping his blue eyes directed on what he was doing as he pressed a few candles through the thick frosting and into the surface of the cake.

"A cake? What for?" The woman asked as she dropped her purse on the kitchen table and left her shoes by the door. She'd been pretty once, and she still was if you didn't look too close. A hard life of disappointment, frustration and sorrow had taken its toll on her. The only smile to find her aging features was fake, a show for those around her while at work. She hid behind it, so no one would see the shell she'd become.

The young man frowned, his sever brows pulling together tighter than usual, and tried not to be offended. "For my birthday." He mumbled, "It was today."

She seemed to hesitate behind where he worked, a pause in her step and should he have turned around, he would have seen the remorseful expression that flittered across her features. But he didn't, and she'd long ago come to the conclusion that she no longer knew how to interact with the child they'd taken in. The boy was supposed to be her's, her husband's, if not by blood then in heart, but he wasn't, not anymore. Maybe he never had been. It made little difference. Things didn't always work out the way they were supposed to.

"…happy birthday." She said a heartbeat late, her voice quiet.

The boy -taller than her now, and heavier for sure- in her care merely nodded a barely there acknowledgment, and still didn't turn.

The woman left the kitchen and wandered down the hall, leaving her foster son alone as he pocketed a lighter and picked up his homemade birthday cake. Grimmjow sighed but wasn't surprised. This was how it was every year, every day. Why would his eighteenth birthday be any different? It didn't matter that it was supposed to be special, that it was supposed to mean something or that it should have been a milestone in his life.

The people that were supposed to take care of him, that were supposed to see him as their son, hardly seemed to see him as a person at all. They didn't really want a child, not anymore, not one that wasn't really their own.

Grimmjow, once a little boy that had been left without a family after surviving a car accident he shouldn't have, had coasted from foster family to foster family, from school to school. Now, he lived with the very last, but he didn't know just how much longer he could stand it. He didn't expect differently from the couple that had taken him in, but that didn't mean he didn't want differently. They'd grudgingly taken him in after hearing that he only had one more chance before he ended up in juvenile detention and, statistically speaking, prison after that. Grimmjow thought maybe they had seen him as their last chance, too, to have a complete family. He'd thought, when they'd first started filling out paperwork and setting up meetings with him, that maybe they could help each other. He was a broken boy. They were a broken couple. A broken family could still be a family.

They were supposed to be good for each other, but things don't always work that way.

They'd tried to have a family of their own once. Grimmjow knew that much even though they didn't talk about it. He'd found the evidence when he was younger, years ago now, after they'd first taken him in. Their son, just a baby still, had died before his third birthday. He didn't know how the smiling little orange-haired boy had died, but it had almost ended their marriage. Grimmjow was sure they'd tried again, they still had all the paper work from the various doctors they'd spent their fortunes on, but they still had no children of their own despite the efforts made by them and by the doctors.

Desperate to save themselves and what they had left of each other, thinking a child would fix the issues that had crept up over time, they had sought to adopt. They'd chosen a boy that would have been their son's age, had their biological boy lived, and they'd spent the first couple years of Grimmjow's stay trying to groom him into what they thought their son should have been. But Grimmjow wasn't the child they'd given birth to, he wasn't the boy they'd lost, nor the solution to their problems.

They'd never finalized the adoption papers, only the ones for foster care. They took him in, took care of him sort of, and were considered his guardians, but he didn't share their last name, just like he didn't fit their role as a worthy son.

So while their house was nice, their cars expensive, their smiles fake and they painted the picture of an outstanding and caring couple, their was no love in the house, nothing to make it into a home. They had loved each other once, or so Grimmjow believed, but the financial issues on top of losing a child had pulled them apart. Fostering a kid they didn't quite want hadn't helped. He'd been thirteen when they had taken him in. Now he was old enough to take care of himself and they holed him up in a spare room and sent him to high school, but they did little else. Grimmjow was left to himself most of the time and while most younger men his age wished they had that, he only grew to loath it over the years.

Grimmjow wasn't the type to make friends easily. Brash and unforgiving in personality, the few that he did make rarely stuck around for long, or they got him in more trouble than he could afford. He acted meek enough around the house, depression and loathing cooling his fire until it was only smoldering coals, but when he was away, when he got some fresh air and had a clearer mind that allowed him to think about his situation, he realized how awful it was. He got angry a lot. So over the few years he'd lived with his current foster parents and went to the local high school, the other kids his age had begun to avoid him.

He'd managed to get a girlfriend once, the year before, but it hadn't lasted long. She hadn't really liked him, nor cared for him in any way other than for his looks. She was just a preppy cheerleader that thought the world ate from her palm, so naturally her friends had dared her to score with the guy everyone thought was scary and deranged. But Grimmjow hadn't really cared for her either, so it didn't really matter.

At six feet tall already, he had the size and build to play sports, but his grades would barely allow for him to stay on a team and he'd already been held back a year. Plus his foster parents demanded that he be home in time for chores. Chores and an orderly schedule made for outstanding gentlemen, or so his foster parents had used to tell him. They didn't say those kinds of things anymore.

So he didn't even have sports as an outlet, nor a way to connect with people his age. He sat in the back of the class all day long, barely paying attention to the teachers as he doodled grotesque things -mostly a car he could just barely make out from his memories, the roof crinkled and the front end gone- on his notes and he spent his evenings doing what little homework he bothered with, just enough to pass his classes, before making sure the house was spotless.

After school and after his chores were done, he typically ate his dinner in his room, avoiding the two who had taken him in and the unbearably heavy air around them. It usually worked out better when they saw little of him, so he spent almost all his time there, hidden away on the second floor of the house, in a room that hadn't been meant for him. They mostly left him alone when he was there, like they forgot about him, forgot that there was a young man they had no relation to in their house.

But he was eighteen now. That should have made everything better, but because he was a ward of the state, he had to graduate before he could leave. The government wanted well educated and upstanding citizens. So it was only a matter of time before he could finally get away, but that time seemed to drag by.

Sneaking passed his foster father, Grimmjow carried his cake up the stairs to where his bedroom was located. He got to the top of the landing when booted feet were dropped to the floor and an angry curse reverberated around the sitting room. Flinching again, the young man sneered as he paused, waiting to hear if he'd be called for. He listened to the angry muttering and the sound of footsteps as they disappeared down the hall that led to the master bedroom below, then continued on his way as a female voice was added to the angry mix.

Once in what passed as his room, Grimmjow set the cake on a desk that had been pushed up against one wall under a window, right next to his bed. Even though night had finally fallen, he pulled the string and raised the blinds. He cracked the window a few inches, just sitting there as he stared out and felt the fresh breeze that drifted through the screen. The smell of his cake wafted back to him and he sighed as he fished the lighter from his pocket. Head propped up in one hand, his elbow on the desk and a carefully controlled expression of boredom on his features, Grimmjow flicked it to life before dragging the flame over the few candles.

Once they were all alight, not eighteen of them because he hadn't found that many and none would have been boughten for him, he sat and stared at the dancing flames. Small and contained, they fluttered in the light breeze coming through his window, nearly blowing out, yet still they danced. Like fire always was, the small flames were hungry for more, something more than just wax, hungry to grow and spread, hungry to consume anything that would burn.

Mind lost in thought, Grimmjow slowly passed his hand over the small flames, feeling their heat sear his palm. It didn't hurt, not really, not enough to make him stop, but it reddened his golden flesh, it made him feel something. Even as his mind continued to wander, lost to its thoughts, the small amount of pain seemed to awaken something in him; that need for more, the need to fill a hole he'd had since he was just a child.

There was something wrong with him, he'd thought to himself on more than one occasion. There was something missing, sitting hollow and empty in the pit of his stomach. He'd been cut open and something essential, something living had been ripped out.

"Just one." He mumbled to himself, eyes trained unblinkingly on the candles. He wandered what it would feel like if he could fill in and reshape what had been taken from him. What would it be like to feel…full? "That's all I want, just one person to keep me company." Someone to call a friend, someone who would stand at his side when he needed it most. Just one person who wouldn't look at him like he was their failed hope and crushed dreams. Someone he didn't look back at and see how broken he was reflected in them.

He watched little beads of molten wax drip down the sides of the few candles. It cooled quickly. It wasn't like the fire, like him. It wasn't hungry. He wasn't like wax, he needed something more than what he'd been given, something that would help him burn and keep him breathing.

Brows furrowing into an almost angry scowl, Grimmjow laughed at himself, his cold blue eyes losing the hard gleam of the mask he put on in front of everyone else. He laughed at his own stupidity for wishing such a thing, he laughed at how childish it was, how weak. He laughed at his own helplessness and he laughed at how close he was to having his freedom but he knew nothing would change. He'd been conditioned to be alone. He would always be alone and some part of him knew that, when he looked deep enough into his own soul. He laughed at that too. Did he even have a soul? If so, it was small and fluttery, locked away in a cage and unable to spread its wings, like a butterfly in a jar. Maybe that was what was missing, what was making him feel so hollow.

But he didn't laugh at the pain his truths caused. He didn't laugh at how utterly far he was from that one thing he wanted the most, that one thing he needed the most. He wasn't greedy, he didn't need much, just one.

"Happy birthday to me." Grimmjow muttered as he blew out his candles. Sitting alone in the darkened room that wasn't really his, he cut himself a piece of cheap birthday cake and ate it from the pan. It was sweet on his tongue but he hardly tasted it. The thick layer of frosting was rich and creamy, but it didn't lighten his mood. All the comfort food in the house wouldn't make his wish come true, wouldn't lift his soul or change his situation.

Unable to finish even that first piece, he pushed the pan away. After sitting unmoving for several, long minutes, he stood up. He grabbed the almost untouched cake and took it back downstairs, knowing what would happen if his foster parents found it still in his room tomorrow. Pausing in the doorway of the sitting room, he glanced at the older man seated on the couch once more, a fresh beer in hand as he watched the last quarter of the game.

"Today was my birthday. I made a cake, if you want a piece..." He didn't really expect a reply or even an acknowledgement, he'd grown used to being ignored, but that didn't mean that it didn't still sting somewhere down inside him. Part of him wanted the man to wish him a happy birthday, to invite him to watch the game with him, even just to look at him, but he shoved that part back down and turned away from his foster father.

He wasn't the son Isshin had wanted, and Grimmjow knew the older man was reminded of that every time he looked at the foster child in his house.

Grimmjow wrapped the cake in cling wrap and set it on the stove. He washed his fork and the few dishes he'd used to bake the cake, then he returned to his room, silent and alone. Closing the door behind himself, he laid down on his bed. He didn't drop onto it, that sort of motion showed too much emotion and he was too numb, but rather he slid under the sheets and rolled onto his stomach, cushioning his head with his arms as he stared at the wall opposite him. After a while, a restless sleep found him.

That night, in the darkness, Grimmjow dreamed. It was dark behind his closed eyes as well, staining his mind like ink. In his dreamscape, the house he lived in was cast in deep shadows, night long ago fallen and never to lift again. Everything was silent for a long time, silent and still and monochrome. It felt hollow, like the missing space in the pit of his stomach.

His foster parents were there, the husband sitting on the couch, passed out after working too many long hours to avoid his house, then drinking himself numb when he'd finally returned. He was the first to go, Grimmjow knew it before it happened. The darkness was suddenly split, like lightening ripping the sky asunder, and it left behind a wide, manic grin as gold flashed in the shadows.

His foster father screamed as red was suddenly added to all the black and grey of the shadows. His foster mother came running, he didn't know where from, but it really didn't matter. Her blood was added to the red already painting the carpet. Like flowers in the spring, the deep crimson of their life blossomed through the air. It splattered the walls, the couch, the flat screen of the tv. It smeared across the windows in a crazed pattern of wet handprints and childish drawings. It flecked the curtains and clung heavy in the air. Bare feet tracked it into the kitchen, slipping slightly on the once clean tile. Red smeared across a white canvas, it splashed ghostly features and stained long fingers, but it couldn't hide that too wide grin.

His foster parents begged. They screamed and cried and struggled in the dark, shivering as the warmth of their blood dripped down pale arms, catching under dark nails. They begged for their lives and something about that was ironic and sad. They begged for it all to stop, but to Grimmjow's way of thinking, they'd stopped living when their real son had. They offered money, possessions, anything at all, but as sickly gold was turned away, slowly traveling up the staircase, step by step by step, and to the door that the only other person in the house slept behind, they said nothing.

The couple that had taken him in but didn't love him didn't beg for his life. They didn't ask that he be spared, they didn't even mention him, not even after their killer showed he knew Grimmjow was in the house. They only thought of themselves. He was just another thing in their house, something they would offer to the monster too.

In his dream, Grimmjow watched as his foster parents were brutally murdered by something so white and so pure, something that wasn't dark like the empty shadows of his mind or of his house, something that burned like fire and felt like ice. Hungry, always hungry. The pale killer, a monster and a man both, dipped his hands in the mess he made. He spread it across the mirrors, he dumped it in the sinks. He filled bowls and took his time setting up a dinner for two at the table. There was so much blood, too much. When it was over, no shadows remained. No black filled the house, no white. Only red. Everything was red and his foster parents were dead, yet still that wicked grin could be seen, something bright and burning and white in the dark.

Grimmjow gasped and bolted upright, his blue eyes impossibly wide in the dark of his bedroom. He scanned the room, panting and sweating in the aftermath of his nightmare as he sought out that too wide grin.

Throwing the covers off, he leapt to the floor, landed on his feet, and took off. He flung his door open so fast he was surprised it stayed on the hinges but he was already halfway down the stairs when it struck the wall behind it, the knob punching through drywall. Taking them three and four at a time, he landed in a ready stance upon the first floor, where he finally slowed.

Still breathing hard, he furrowed his brows as he slowly looked around. The house was clean, the shadows intact. The cake he'd made sat on the stove where he'd put it, another piece missing. He turned to the sitting room to find his foster father passed out on the couch in front of the television, infomercials playing across the bright screen.

Swallowing as he regained control of his breathing and his panic, Grimmjow quietly crept over to the sleeping man and took the remote. He shut the tv off and put the remote back on the coffee table before cleaning up a few of the empty beer cans and throwing them in the recycling bin. Sighing to himself, Grimmjow silently padded down the hall, pushing the master bedroom door open just far enough to see his foster mother was asleep in the bed -light brown, nearly blond hair splashed over the pillow- before he closed it once more and made his way back upstairs.

The door to his room was closed, but he didn't put much thought into it and he pushed it open, backing into the room so that he could just as quietly pull it shut behind him, conscious of waking up his caretakers now that he was no longer panicking. Turning around, he faced his empty room, finding it just as dark and quiet as the rest of the house had been, despite his horrifying nightmare.

Pushing a hand back through his chaotic, oddly colored hair, Grimmjow sighed again and tiredly climbed back into bed. He pulled the blankets back over himself and rolled over to face the blank, white wall his bed was pushed up against. Closing his eyes, he shifted about to get comfortable, kicking something heavy in the process.

Frowning, Grimmjow grumbled under his breath and rolled back over to glare at the offending object, only to yelp and bolt back upright as a young man looked back at him. A friendly smile adorned fair features, haloed in spiky hair of almost familiar, riotous orange. The young man pulled a fork from his mouth with an appreciative hum as Grimmjow stared at him in shocked and stunned silence.

"This is really good!" The young man exclaimed quietly, cutting away another piece of cake with the edge of his fork. "Chocolate is my favorite. Did you make it?"

Grimmjow nodded numbly before scrambling even further upright, finding his senses again. "Who the fuck are you?!" He half yelled, half whispered in an aggressive voice, still trying to stay quiet so that he didn't wake his foster parents.

"Oh, my name's Ichigo." The boy said, smiling again as he took another bite, still sitting at the foot of Grimmjow's bed where nothing had sat only moments before.

"Who- what are you doing in my house? How did you get in here?" Grimmjow climbed to his feet, towering over the seated lad, every hard line of muscle on his body rigid with aggression and caution.

The young man looked up at him with warm ocher eyes, the picture of calm and unfazed by his temper. "I heard your wish."

"My... What? Get the hell out of my room." Grimmjow snarled at the stranger, his shoulders hunching slightly as he stooped lower and closer to the odd boy.

"Your wish." Ichigo repeated, looking up patiently at the bigger teen. "The one you made for your birthday, remember? I want to be your friend."

Grimmjow stared at the man for a moment, his features tugged into a shocked and incredulous expression. After that moment, his upper lip curled to flash white teeth as his frigid gaze narrowed. "You're crazy. Get out of my house before I make you."

The orange haired boy let out a good natured laugh, a handsome smile creasing his features and lighting up his eyes. He set aside the cake he'd been eating, carefully laying the fork on the plate so he didn't make a mess. Then, crossing his hands in his lap, he tilted his head as he looked up at the taller young man. "It doesn't work that way. I can't just leave, you created me."

"I- what?" Grimmjow's angry expression fell into something a little more confused. "You don't make any sense. Leave."

The boy named Ichigo sighed, finally starting to show some exasperation. "I already told you it doesn't work like that. I'm your wish, the friend you wanted. You created me."

When Grimmjow said nothing, just stared down at the odd young man, Ichigo continued.

"If you really want me to leave, you'll have to destroy me yourself." He told the bigger man, leaning back to support his weight on his hands while he continued to look up at Grimmjow, unfazed by the hight difference most would find daunting. "I can only be sent away by my creator. It's not that hard to do. However you would destroy a normal person should work."

"You mean... kill you...?" Grimmjow's eyes widened as he stared down at the strange person, most of his aggression slowly draining away, replaced by equal parts confusion and curiosity.

Ichigo shrugged. "Well, yes. I suppose that's what it would be called here."

"I-I'm not going to kill you! I don't even know you!" Grimmjow was at a loss. "Why the hell would I want to kill you?"

The smaller's features lit up again, that happy smile back as he sat up straight again and clasped his hands in front of himself excitedly. "Good! Then we can be friends?" He asked with a hopeful gleam in his brown eyes.

"Uhhh... Ok, fine– I don't know. This is…" Grimmjow slowly sat down on the edge of his bed, never taking his eyes from the stranger. "How did you get in here though? I should have seen you when I came into the room."

"Oh, I guess I haven't answered most of your questions yet." Ichigo smiled over at the bigger man sitting next to him, picking up his piece of cake again. "I walked in I guess. Maybe... That's what most people do, right?" He tilted his head in thought, fork sticking out of his mouth. "Are we upstairs or downstairs?"

"Uh, we're on the second floor..."

"Oh... I guess I didn't walk then. I don't remember the stairs I heard you run down. Up. I think the other one brought me." Ichigo shrugged, taking a bite of the cake before holding it up almost proudly to show it to Grimmjow. "He brought me this. Happy birthday, by the way."

"Thanks..." Grimmjow slowly cast his vision around his darkened room. It was empty except for himself and the other young man seated next to him. "There's another one? In here?"

"Hmm, no, it's just me." Ichigo took the last bite of his cake, licking the frosting from the fork. "And you of course."

Grimmjow watched him for a moment, silent, before his sever brows furrowed all over again. "But you just said..."

"Yeah, I know." Ichigo sighed and set aside the fork. "But it's hard being real." He huffed and crossed his arms. "Do you have any idea how tough it is? Of course you do, you are real. The rules here are different than where I'm from. It'll get easier though, I'll get the hang of it."

Again it took Grimmjow a moment to respond.

"So... are you real, or am I just seeing things?" Grimmjow stifled a yawn, glancing over at his alarm clock. He'd have to be up for school in a couple hours, but he wasn't too worried about being late, or not showing up at all.

"Eh, that's a grey area right now. I'm kind of real. I will be real. The longer I'm around the more real I'll be, but you're seeing things too." Ichigo turned to Grimmjow, a hopeful gleam in his expressive eyes. "Can I have more cake?"

"Great, so now I'm crazy and I'm talking to something that may or may not be real." Grimmjow couldn't help the small, almost dry and helpless chuckle that escaped him and a bit of a smirk tilted his lips. The only humor in the expression was mocking at best. Why wouldn't more go wrong with his life? And just when he'd been trying to convince himself everything would get better soon. He finally shrugged in answer to the stranger's question and stood from the bed. Why not. "Stay here, I'll get you another piece."

"I'm a he, not a something..." Ichigo scowled for a moment, watching as the blue haired young man that had brought him to life crossed the room to the door. As Grimmjow pushed the door open to leave the room and get Ichigo his second piece of cake, Ichigo's scowl let up again. "Thank you!"

Grimmjow snorted a small laugh, the smirk still slanting his features, though a tiny bit of the dry bitterness lessened. At least his imagination was conjuring up something cute for him to make friends with. It was better than nothing. Anyone, real or not, was better than being completely alone. "No problem, just stay here and stay quiet."

"Ok." Ichigo whispered quietly back to him, scooting further onto the bed so that his back rested against the wall. He smiled as he watched Grimmjow disappear into the short hall that led to the stairwell, as silent as a ghost.

The blue haired young man quickly scurried down the stairs. Having long ago grown used to them over the years, he made not a sound. He peeked into the sitting room, seeing his foster father still passed out on the couch, before ducking into the kitchen. As he stepped through the wide doorway, his back to the sitting room and the stairwell, quiet, rushed footsteps sounded from somewhere near the couch.

Grimmjow spun around, expecting to see Ichigo following behind him, but no one stood near him and the sitting room to his back was empty save for his drunken foster parent. Turning back toward the kitchen, he caught movement out of the corner of his eye, hardly a relief to the shadows of the house as something darted off toward the hallway. Grimmjow jolted in surprise before his brows furrowed and he quickly but quietly took off after the fleeing figure.

"Ichigo!" He hissed, keeping his voice low so as to not awaken anyone, but still loud enough that the boy should have heard him. He didn't receive an answer and the young man he chased after didn't pause. As Grimmjow turned into the hallway, standing in its entrance, a door that led to a small office room halfway down the hall swayed on its hinges.

"Hey, you were supposed to stay put…!" Grimmjow darted in that direction, pushing the door open the rest of the way, but again he found no one and the room was empty. "Ichigo?"

A frown tugging at his features, Grimmjow turned from the room, closing the door behind him with the quiet click of the latch. Down at the end of the hallway, he just barely caught someone swiftly dart passed the entrance, back toward the kitchen again.

"Ichigo!" He called in a whisper again, following behind the figure. A barely there chuckle reached his ears, like the boy was toying with him and enjoying every second of it.

He entered the kitchen to once again find no one. Shaking his head, Grimmjow looked about the room and was about to turn and continue his search for the wandering young lad when he realized that a clean plate sat next to the cake, but only two pieces were missing still. Raising a brow, Grimmjow muttered under his breath in exasperation and pulled the plastic wrap away from the cake. Cutting a piece, he set it on the plate and turned away from the stove. Leaving the kitchen, he peeked into the sitting room and then down the hall again, looking for where Ichigo could have gone.

With a quiet growl, Grimmjow quickly scaled the stairs, going back to his room. He pushed the door open, expecting the room to be empty, only to see Ichigo sitting on the bed leaning back against the wall like he had been when Grimmjow had left.

"Jeeze, if I would have known getting a piece of cake was so difficult I wouldn't have asked for another." The orange haired man said quietly, his voice barely above a whisper as he stayed nearly silent like his new friend had asked. "Did you get lost?"

"What? No, I didn't get lost." Grimmjow sneered at him, seating himself on the bed and handing over the plate. As he had before, Ichigo's face split into a smile too innocent for his apparent age as he accepted the chocolate cake, eagerly digging in. "I was chasing you around, why didn't you stay here like I had told you to?"

"I didn't leave." Ichigo pouted slightly, a scowl pulling at his boyishly handsome features while he stuck a bite in his mouth. "I've been sitting here waiting. Real life is boring when there's no one around, by the way. Normally I'd just conjure up my own little town and kill monsters and become a hero or something, but you can't do that here... I tried while you were getting cake. Nothing happened."

The frown didn't last long as the odd boy enjoyed his treat. The orange haired teen's carefree mannerisms and the way he simply spoke his mind was refreshing, and it helped to push back the stifling silence Grimmjow was normally surrounded by, but the bigger man's features still pulled into a slightly perplexed expression, a bit of confusion and even curiosity showing through. Grimmjow watched the strange lad eat a few bites, seemingly unconcerned about the accusations being held against him. "Ichigo?"

"Hmm?" Molten brown eyes turned upward as Ichigo pulled the fork from his mouth, cutting away another bite.

"You stayed up here like I asked?"

"Yep. Don't want to wake up the people you live with." Ichigo told the bigger man, tilting his head slightly as he continued to look at Grimmjow with his expressive gaze, the chocolatey treat perched on the edge of his fork. "Why?"

"And you're sure there isn't another, uh, one of whatever you are here?" Grimmjow shifted where he sat, scooting back to match Ichigo's positioning and lean against the wall behind his bed.

"I'm a person, almost just like you." Ichigo sighed and rolled his eyes. "Remember? A he, not a thing."

"Right..." Grimmjow mumbled. "Sorry. So are you sure you're the only one here?"

"It's ok, you'll get the hang of me being real too." A pleased smile creased Ichigo's features at Grimmjow's correction. "And... Well, there's you and I, and of course your fake mom and dad. That's so strange to me, why would you live with-"

"Ichigo."

"Hmm?" The smaller looked up from his chocolaty treat again.

"Is there anyone else? Besides the four of us?" Grimmjow pushed. "Earlier you weren't sure..."

"Oh. Nope, just us." Ichigo swallowed down another bite. "Why? Seeing things? I think I said that earlier too."

Grimmjow snorted a small sound and curled his lip. "Yeah, I guess you did."

Eventually, Grimmjow curled back up on his bed, Ichigo sitting happily at the foot where he'd been the whole of the night, and went back to sleep. He was awakened early the next morning by his foster mother pounding on his door.

"Grimmjow, get up! You're going to be late."

The young man rolled over and cracked his eyes open to glare death at the door. He'd only finally settled down for the night an hour or so before, there was no way he was dragging himself from bed. At his feet, Ichigo shifted. Grimmjow looked down his body at the boy to find him seated cross legged almost exactly where he'd left him before falling asleep, though his brown eyes were wide and trained on the door like he expected it to burst open and some sort of horrible monster to swoop into the room.

Grimmjow snorted a laugh. "She's not that bad. The man's the one you gotta worry about, when he drinks."

"What was that?" His foster mother shouted through the door at him. She didn't open it though, like the room was off limits to her, despite it being her house.

"I said I'm not goin'!" Grimmjow grumbled, turning his vision back toward the door as he began making himself comfortable again and prepared to go back to sleep. "I'm not feelin' well."

"Well it serves you right for eating half a chocolate cake." The woman scolded.

"What? I didn't-" His eyes narrowed as he looked down at Ichigo again. The orange haired boy wore a sheepish, guilty expression. Grimmjow sighed and addressed his foster parent again. "You caught me. Now can I go back to sleep before I puke it all back up?"

The woman scoffed, complaining under her breath about how he was going to be held back another year, but he listened to her retreating footsteps as she wandered back down the stairs to continue getting ready for work. Grimmjow turned back to his guest, sitting up and letting the blankets fall from his upper half. "You ate half of a cake?" He asked in a quiet voice, a blue brow arching.

Ichigo ducked in a sheepish motion, a small but bright smile on his handsome features. "I was bored while you were sleeping..."

"You were bored-" Grimmjow paused, shaking his head as he chastised the young man, "Ichigo, you have to stay up here. You can't let them see you."

"I know." Ichigo's small smile turned into an equally small frown as he crossed his arms defensively. "I stayed here, just like you said. I haven't moved all night."

"Then how did you get the cake?"

"I-" Ichigo started to answer, only cut himself off with a deeper frown as he thought. "Hmm... I don't really know. I think it was brought to me again."

Grimmjow scrubbed a hand down his still tired features as he flopped back to the mattress. He blew out a sigh and shook his head slightly. "Things don't work that way here, Ichigo. It didn't magically cut itself and appear up here."

A scowl tugged at boyish features. "I didn't leave your room." Ichigo insisted, unhappy about being wrongly accused.

"Well I didn't bring it to you." Grimmjow pointed out. "And neither of my foster parents did. There's no one else in the house."

"Not anymore..." Ichigo muttered petulantly. "It's just chocolate cake, I don't understand why you're upset at me..."

"I'm not upset, and the cake isn't the issue. You just need to stay aw- wait." Grimmjow bolted upright again, his eyes narrowed on Ichigo. "What did you say?"

Orange brows arched as Ichigo managed to look both surprised and a little uneasy, like he again wasn't sure what he'd done wrong. "I said it was just cake..."

"No, before that. You said there wasn't anyone else here anymore..." Grimmjow eyed the strange young man with a critical, cold blue gaze. "What's that mean? Was there someone else here earlier? Even though you said there wasn't."

Ichigo chewed the inside of his cheek while he thought, brown eyes straying toward the door of the bedroom. "I don't know... I think maybe, while you were sleeping. He likes purple. You get it by mixing red and blue."

I know how to make purple." Grimmjow said offhandedly, brushing the comment off. He leaned forward where he sat, his hands closing around Ichigo's upper arms, and redirected the topic back to what was important, "What do you mean you think? Was there or wasn't there? Who the hell else is in my house!?" His voice was a demanding growl.

"I don't know!" Ichigo pulled back with wide eyes, trying to escape the harsh grip as his features twisted with discomfort and unease. "This is hard, ok? I didn't create me or the other one! It's your mind, you should be the one to know."

Blue brows furrowed all the harder, but Grimmjow relaxed his grip and allowed his hands to be pushed away from the smaller's person. He frowned at what Ichigo seemed to be implying, thinking back to the events of that night. He was already starting to feel like he was losing his mind. What other explanation made sense for all this? If his caretakers found out he was talking to an imaginary boy hidden up in his room, he was sure they would jump on the chance to lock him away, where they wouldn't have to bother with him anymore. It would be the perfect out for them. They'd be pitied, seen as the unfortunate and tragic parents that had tried as hard as they could to no avail.

With another small sigh, Grimmjow laid back down again, and rolled over onto his side. An hour of sleep wasn't enough rest to be tormenting himself with all this. "In a few hours, they should be at work. We'll go downstairs and I'll show you a few things about being real, ok?" He asked in a mumbled voice, closing brilliant blue eyes.

A small smile twitched on his lips as he felt the being still seated at the foot of his bed wiggle excitedly. He vaguely felt Ichigo shift to make himself more comfortable as his mind began to drift back into the still, calm darkness of sleep.

Thoughts? Be sure to tell me your theories and ideas, I thrive off of them!