Work Text:
Rukia is an amazing person. Orihime admires her from the beginning, and even when she starts to feel those hints of jealousy, she can only feel bad for ever considering such an emotion, because she really thinks that Rukia is truly amazing, that she doesn’t deserve something like that.
She admires her so much that she can’t stand the idea of ever thinking anything even remotely negative about her. Orihime takes some time to put two and two together, but her admiration for Rukia goes a bit farther than she realizes, and her jealousy isn’t what she thinks it is.