Betting it on a Name (Rukia/Shiro)

He sure was cocky, wasn't he? At first Rukia would've said he reminded her a little bit of some old friends, but...well, that'd probably be a little mean to said friends, huh? Oh well.

"Oh, already asking me out to dinner, huh? Is this another bet, that you're expecting me to enjoy it? Or is this just a way to make everyone think you've got the situation down?"

Nevertheless, Rukia picked up her paperwork, carefully organizing it all into her bag. She was finished for the day, so she supposed she didn't have much else going on. Besides, a free meal sounded fine by her.

"Lead the way, then."

Rather obviously, Rukia was not aware that Shiro had any further classes after hers. So far as she was concerned, their relationship as teacher and student had not changed in the slightest here. If he expected her to treat this like it was some sort of date, he'd be very disappointed.

"You take all your favorite teachers there, or just the ones lucky enough to see you put that big head of yours to use?"

Despite her teasing, Rukia's tone was definitely less outright condescending than it had been before. First, class was over, so she naturally let herself relax at least a little bit. Second, though, and perhaps more pressingly, there was some degree of genuine goodwill toward Shiro now. Yeah, he was still a lazy moron, but at least he could pull something off if he tried.

It actually caught Rukia a touch off guard, having him comment on her status as a noble in such a way. She was willing to trade jabs on a great many topics, but the difficulty of life for those outside the nobility was not one of them. That was a bit more personal for her.

"Yeah, I know. I probably remember my days in the Rukongai better than most of my years as a Kuchiki."

She'd leave it at that, though any lightheartedness in her tone was mostly gone now, and her gaze was certainly a bit harder as they entered into the ramen shop. Well, if she'd been in a better mood, she likely would have thought this place seemed precious, but at the moment, she wasn't too concerned with the atmosphere or anything like that. She gave a polite nod and a wave to the proprietors, but she took her seat and looked through the menu without much in the way of words.

Well, that was a good order from him, at least. Rukia'd half expected him to order something awful, and that'd have really just added to the whole mess, wouldn't it have?

"I wanted to help. Idling around the Kuchiki estate and sneaking off to Earth now and again weren't really doing it for me."

She shrugged at that, thinking over her previous goings-on in life for only a second or two. She'd done a lot, huh? And then...well, she'd done a lot less after that. It wasn't like there was less to be done, either, but she'd managed to be a whole lot less useful than she probably should have been. Go figure.

"I think a lot of us old-timers started wondering if we were worth much after demons set up shop around here. Personally, I'm just trying to make sure I've still got it in me to help out."

"Do you now? Even after I dropped that book on your desk? How sweet of you."

Rukia's voice made it fairly clear that she was still a bit sour over that comment he'd made, but if nothing else, she was a little cheered up by the compliment. Even if he was an idiot, it was nice to know he appreciated it.

"Well thanks. Hopefully you keep paying attention in my lessons so all that hard work isn't going to waste, huh?"

Ah, the food was here. Despite her mood, it was fairly easy to see the hint of excitement in her eyes as she noticed the hard-boiled egg cut into halves in her bowl. Did she eat it now, or save it for the end..? Ah, why not both? One half now, the other later. Genius.