Karin would love to say she woke to the sound of birds chirping like little harps from Heaven and the feeling of sunlight rays lazily radiating across her face. However, reality had other things in mind...

"OH MY GOODNESS KARIN IS SLEEPING WITH A BOY I REPEAT MY LITTLE SISTER IS SLEEPING WITH A BOY DAD GET THE CAMERA YUZU GET A STICK OR SOMETHING I AM GOING TO BASH I MEAN INTERROGATE THIS ONE!"

This can NOT be happening, bleary-eyed Karin opened her eyes to the sight of a familiar tuft of flaming orange hair. Out of what could only be considered habit, her fist extended out and made contact with her brother's face. "Shut UP Ichigo. I swear if the time is before nine I will rip out every orange hair on your head and stick it up where the sun don't shine."

"That's...quite graphic," An unexpected voice commented dryly. It came from her left side. Huh? Karin turned her head to face Hitsugaya- her seat mate from school. What? Bewildered, she looked around. She was lying on her sofa, in the living room with a thin blanket draped over her. Oh...right. I asked if Hitsugaya wanted to sleep over. Whoops, sorry Ichigo.

"Ow... what was that for?" Ichigo whimpered, nursing his now bruised jaw. "Now my incredibly good looks suffer a fatal blow... what are you going to do if I lose my fans? You owe me a pudding Karin!"

"You know Karin doesn't like to be disturbed in her sleep Ichigo. This ones on you," Yuzu piped in. Karin groaned, now Yuzu's here? Great might as well as invite my father and make it a party. That thought barely made it out of her head before a loud screaming-crying sound echoed around the walls of her apartment.

"MASAAAAKI our Karin's all grown up now...she's brought a boy home," Her father stood in the hallway sniffling as Yuzu handed him a tissue. "The children's all made it on their own...they don't need us anymore. I'm going to retire and move to the country side to be a farmer..." he sobbed.

"Gee, are you the only normal one in your family?" Hitsugaya commented sarcastically, earning him the glares of both Ichigo and her father. Karin rolled her eyes.

"Nah man, Yuzu is pretty normal too," She replied, earning her indignant heys from the rest of her family. Karin sighed, "Ichigo, dad. This is Hitsugaya, a friend from school. Hitsugaya this is my dad and brother." Upon her introduction, the two parties nodded tentatively to each other.

"Yesterday, Hitsugaya and I were held at gunpoint at the grocer, y store down the street- I will be taking questions at the end," She stated, gesturing to her father and brother, "After dealing with the police, I invited Hitsugaya to crash my place because he saved my life and my father didn't raise no ungrateful child- right?" Her father nodded reluctantly.

"So, all in all. I'm sorry for not running it by you guys first but it was kind of a my call or no call situation and I hope we can figure something else. Okay I will allow five minutes for questions," Karin concluded. Damn five minutes was long, I hope it wasn't a mistake.

"I'll go first," Yuzu piped in, "How far did you two go?" Karin rubbed her temples. This was a mistake.

"We did nothing of the sort. I'm a high school student for goodness sake. I'm grateful to him because he saved my life. Next."

Her father's hand waved frantically in the air. What is this... grade school? Karin rolled her eyes. "Papa is so proud of you. I'll agree to Hitsugaya staying as long as we establish some ground rules. Also how long will he be staying for?"

Karin shrugged. "I agree with the house rules and I'm not sure about the length- Hitsugaya help me out?"

"Um I guess until a find a place of my own? I'm trying to find a place right now but I don't know how so home-finding has been kinda slow." Yuzu's brown eyes lit up at his words.

"Actually that sounds great! Karin can accompany you after school to find a place- she's really attentive to details." Karin shot a look to her sister. How does that help with apartment hunting? Her face says.

Yuzu shot back a thinly veiled grin. Trust. Me. You get to spend more time with this cutie. He finds a house. Its a win win situation here. "Yeah I'd be super grateful for any advice," Hitsugaya answered brightly.

What happened to the super gloomy, petulant Hitsugaya we met at the start of school, Karin wondered, not that I mind though he's kinda cute when he's cheerful. Wait not like that kind of attractive cute. Cute, like a puppy. Oh shut up Karin. She sighs, "Fine," agreeing begrudgingly.

"Whilst I am beYOND excited to see that my baby sister is agreeing to go on some probably super boring date with some ugly rude guy, isn't it Tuesday today? As in Tuesday the second day of the school week. As in we have school?" Ichigo interjected, gesturing at the clock. "I'm sure we can discuss this later today when we aren't in a hurry to get to where we are supposed to be."

For what was probably the first time in his life. Ichigo was right.

"We are totally going to be late oh my goodness, lets go Yuzu!" Karin yelped seeing the late time. Yuzu grinned and threw Karin her backpack, having already packed her lunch for her. She also handed Hitsugaya a lunch box, having anticipated the white-haired boy's addition to the Kurosaki family.

"When we are solving this equation, we want to keep x on the one side so..." The monotonic voice dragged on, sending Karin into the very dangerous zone of sleep territory. Her head tilted forward, eyes drooping as she struggled to stay awake. Beside her, Hitsugaya was diligently scribbling down notes from the board. It's fine, I'll just grab notes off him. I'll just close my eyes one at a time, it'll be right.

"Karin Kurosaki!" The teacher barked. "Since you seem to be so confident you know this subject well enough to sleep in it, you can answer this question!" That snapped Karin out of her daze. Since when did they get to answering questions? Weren't they just teaching theory? With a deep sign, Karin trudged towards the front of the class, resigning herself to be humiliated in front of the class.

"It's zero," Hitsugaya whispered to her as she passed him. Karin appreciated the gesture, but the teacher wasn't going to let her off with just the right answer.

The blackboard loomed over her with demonic looking scribbles in dusty white chalk. You know the subject is terrible when we here in the 21st century and yet we are still using blackboard. She stared at the equation for some time. Confidently, she turned to the teacher. "Sorry Ms, but I'm allergic to blackboard chalk you see. The allergies are making me unable to solve the question."

The teacher narrowed her eyes at Karin whilst the class chortled in laughter. "Very funny Kurosaki. Go back to your seat and start paying attention. Otherwise we'll be looking at supplementary classes for you."

Karin started to protest, "But-"

"Not another word from you," The teacher interjected, "Go."

"Yes Miss," Karin mumbled.

"Since when were you little miss popular?" Hitsugaya snarked as Karin slid back into her chair.

"Since when were we on banter terms?" Karin muttered back.

"Since we became best friends, best friend."

"I want gloomy new kid back Hitsugaya. I can't deal with all this snark."

"Karin KUROSAKI. If you have something to say, share it with the rest of us. See me after class." Hitsugaya sniggered, as he smugly continued copying down the notes from the board. "Toshiro seeing that you find Miss Kurosaki's situation so funny, why don't you join us after class."

It was Karin's to turn to crack a small smile. Karma was finally working her magic. Now if only this teacher could slip on a banana peel or something... Karin found herself lost in her imaginary revenge on the teacher for the rest of the lesson. Her daydreams were interrupted by the blaring alarm that signaled the end of class.

"Okay class, homework will be all exercises in sets 5A and 5B in the textbook. I'll see all of you tomorrow. Karin. Hitsugaya." She signaled for the two to come out of class. The boys in the class all OOH-ed, only to be silenced by Karin's piercing glare.

"Okay you two, I don't want you two to be distracted like that again. Do I make myself clear?" The teacher reprimanded the two, making them kneel with their hands in the air. Hitsugaya and Karin nodded reluctantly. "Hitsugaya, you have excellant grades and I don't want you getting distracted by Kurosaki. Kurosaki, learn from Hitsugaya. Your grades can do with some improvement," The teacher paused in thought, "In fact, Hitsugaya why don't you give some supplementary lessons to Kurosaki after school for extra credit? It'll also serve as an excellent reference."

Karin looked up in protest, "Miss, I have soccer after school. I won't miss it for the world!"

The teacher shrugged, "You two work something out then, and see me after tomorrow's class about it. Karin I know soccer is important to you, but you should also care about your grades."

Hitsugaya piped up, "We'll do that Miss."

The teacher nodded, "Okay for the rest of the punishment, you two stay out here until the next class begins." As she walked away, Karin glanced sideways at Hitsugaya.

"Yo, I actually can't miss soccer though. We play in a league after school every day. Winning team gets three hundred bucks." She whispered.

Hitsugaya laughed. "It'll be right," He whispered back, "We'll just learn after soccer. How bad are your grades anyway?"

Karin replied with a wry smile.

A/N: Hey guys its been a LONG time. Bleach has ended but I wanted to see this through. Theres a lot of dialogue in this chapter, but I'm going to try pick up the pace afterwards. We'll see a bit more of the class and the soccer team in the next chapter and get the arc started :) As usual, drop a comment if you enjoyed it or have something to say about it and I really appreciate any feedback on it! Thanks!