Chapter Text
Oh crap! My pace sped up as I felt fat rain droplets slowly begin to trickle down my face, before the heavens opened and a torrential downpour cascaded down, successfully drenching me within minutes as I ran down the pavement seeking shelter - typical, this had to happen on the one day I forgot my umbrella.
As if from nowhere, a motorbike raced down the flooded street and straight into a puddle right next to me, further soaking me in water without an apology or even a second glance; what the hell? I wiped my dripping hair from my face and death-stared the motorbike’s retreating form with anger bubbling in my chest, focusing all of my attention on that heartless biker’s back and their stupid studded jacket. Isn’t that a road hazard? What's the point of even having a motorcycle jacket to protect you if you would get impaled by it anyway if you fell off?
As my thoughts were occupied by the biker and their questionable attire, I paid no attention to where I was walking, or anything around me for that matter. Suddenly, my face erupted in pain and I felt a nauseating falling sensation, followed by more pain spreading across my whole body as my back hit the ground with a sickening crack. My mind was blank as I attempted to process what had just happened.
After a moment of lying on the ground completely still, I finally opened my eyes and attempted to sit up, but that only resulted in my vision swimming and black spots appearing across my eyesight - luckily, that only lasted a few seconds before my vision cleared and the queasy feeling in my stomach left. Only then did I feel something sticky trickling down my face, and I lifted my hand up to my face to see what it was, before flinching in pain as my fingers brushed my nose. Great.
As I glanced up to see what I had crashed into, my heart clenched in embarrassment as I saw what was in front of me: a lamppost. Of course. Only the great Nagisa Shiota could perform such a stunt (and in public as well!), but thankfully the Gods were on my side today as no one was on the streets to see what had just transpired. Despite my throbbing body I felt blessed that the streets were deserted, so as a symbol of my appreciation, I raised my arms to the sky and threw back my head in silent thanks to whatever higher power had sprinkled me in their good fortune.
I was just about to get up from my ridiculous position on the ground, before I heard a kind of clicking sound echo behind me. It sort of sounded like… a camera… oh. Please no. I slowly turned my head around, dreading what was behind me. It could have been anything right? No need to worry...right? My head finally stopped turning as my eyes met with a sight that made me want to curl into a ball and die.
It was a person. He was holding a phone in his right hand, while his left one clutched an umbrella above his head. I felt his eyes bore into mine but I refused to meet his gaze, too mortified to move. The figure in front of me quickly crouched down to my level so that I didn’t get a chance to look away, and his amber eyes clashed with my cobalt blue ones; a smirk was also evident on his face, and at that moment I knew that he had seen everything. While I was sitting there still paralysed with shock, I vaguely registered that, although this boy was around the same age as me, I had never actually seen him before - I guess that was a small blessing, considering that there were many worse people that could have witnessed my little performance.
After a minute of just staring at each other, I began to feel slightly uneasy, as the rain continued to pour down and I was getting more and more soaked. A shiver ran up my spine, and I knew that I needed to get out of this rain as soon as possible to avoid being ill for school next week. Urgh, the thought of school immediately put me in a bad mood and even succeeded in pulling me out of the weird trance I seemed to be in.
I broke eye contact with the still-grinning boy in front of me and stood up, my body aching in protest - I couldn’t be 100% sure, but I knew that I had at least not broken any bones, probably just gained some impressive bruises. Even after I had stood up and brushed myself off (little good that did but whatever), those amber orbs still refused to look away from me. I half-expected him to just stay like that, or even offer me a space under his umbrella. However, he just clicked his tongue and turned around to walk away from me. What a jerk!
I just let a ‘tch’ sound and stomped away back home, not even trying to hurry now that I was practically dripping with water anyway. Who did that guy think he was? He must be some kind of sick sadist to take photos of poor helpless people on the streets who have just been through a traumatic and embarrassing experience. Okay, maybe I was being a little too dramatic, but this guy could have just been a decent human being and been a little more courteous - he could have helped me up, or even just have the common decency to not look as if he was enjoying my awkwardness and humiliation.
I took a deep breath and tried to calm down. Who cares anyway? I’d never even seen this guy before, and there was no point in getting mad at some random stranger that I’ll never even see again. I then blocked him and his stupid smirk from my mind, and continued to splash my way home.
The Next Week...
I had been dreading this day ever since the last school year ended: the first day back at school. Not only was I in a bad mood, but I was also completely alone. I hadn’t even seen any of my friends yet, which is probably a bonus for them as at least they won’t catch my gross disease - but I hadn’t seen them in weeks and yes, I admit that I have been bored and lonely without them. Unfortunately, I knew that none of them were very punctual (especially on the first Monday back at school), and since I had arrived early today, I knew that I was probably going to be alone until at least the first lesson. I let out a sigh, but didn’t allow myself to wallow in my self-pity for too long. Oh well, I have nothing better to do now than head to class and hope that I won’t be the only one there.
At the start of every new school year, each class met before lessons in an assigned classroom, which was usually the same every year; for our class, we were assigned some random classroom next to the cafeteria that wasn’t actually used for any lessons. It was quite a small and damp room, but no one really cared when it came to our class, as we had quite a bad rep in the school. Gosh, what’s gotten into me recently? I’ve seriously been so brooding and pessimistic, it’s not like me at all. Come to think of it, these abnormal mood swings only began after I met… No. It doesn’t matter anymore, I just need to forget about that whole fiasco.
I nodded my head determinedly, and began to stride confidently to my classroom with a newly-found resolve. On my way there, a few other students turned my way and gave me strange looks, but I was unfazed and in high-spirits so I gave them a cheerful wave and carried on striding to my destination. Nothing can get me down! I am a new and improved man, with the willpower to succeed this year! I can do anything! Scoff all you want, but I will be the best, I will–
As I turned the corner and entered my dingy assigned classroom, my feet ground to a halt and my cheerful smile immediately froze on my face. Hell no. I must be dreaming. This cannot possibly be real. I slowly blinked and even rubbed my eyes for good measure, but as soon as I reopened them, my jaw opened in sheer disbelief at what was waiting for me in the classroom. Those eyes. They were the ones that I had tried so hard to eject from my memory.
“ You… ” I whispered, as my eyes narrowed at the figure perched on top of my desk, looking as if he owned the place. His eyes lit up as they turned to meet my fierce gaze, before he looked around the classroom and then pointed at himself in mock confusion, one eyebrow raised. A scowl never left my face, I really wasn’t in the mood for joking around; my mood had gone from 100 to 0 very quickly. “You’re sitting on my desk,” I practically spat at him, but he didn’t make any indication that he would be moving anytime soon; instead, a grin spread across his face and he just sat like that, watching me from his perch.
“Oh, how rude of me,” he purred, “I haven’t introduced myself.” I really couldn't be bothered to deal with this right now so I just gave him a withering glance and sat down by the desk farthest from my usual one - but I guess it’s his now, I warily admitted. My patience began to wear extremely thin as I heard the boy start to tap his foot on my ex-desk, but what really pissed me off was when he began to hum along to the tune of Mickey by Toni Basil. Oh god, why did I have to be stuck in a classroom with this guy?
I glanced down at my phone to check the time, and then proceeded to slam my forehead onto the desk when I saw that we still had 40 minutes until the rest of the class would arrive. I just started to drift off and welcome the blissful release of sleep, when I heard a voice begin to sing behind me: quietly at first, but then steadily growing in volume. It was only then that I realised that the boy had moved to sit on top of the desk beside me, and was beginning to serenade me with a dreadful chant that I knew would be stuck in my head for the rest of the day.
“Oh Mickey, you’re so fine, you’re so fine you blow my mind–”
“Don’t you even think about singing that godawful song,” I cut in. If I was going to be stuck alone in a classroom with this guy, I wasn’t going to put up with this kind of torture. The boy in question looked slightly annoyed that I had cut his performance short and, for a brief moment, I thought that he would just stop and leave me alone - of course, I should have known that I would have no such luck. He slowly leaned forward towards me whilst still sitting on the desk, before he spread his arms wide and opened his mouth, with an almost innocent expression on his face. I was momentarily transfixed by his sudden change in demeanor, but I quickly snapped out of it after I realised what he was about to do.
“I can show you the wooooorld⁓ Shining, shimmering spleeeeendid⁓, tell me, Princess,” and at that he looked me dead in the eyes and gave me an eyebrow wiggle. Right, that’s it, I’ve had enough of this guy’s shit! I suddenly stood up from my chair and slammed my hands down onto the desk in front of me, my eyes glaring daggers into those stupid amber eyes that looked mildly taken aback by my sudden ferocious outbreak.
“I don’t care who you are, I don’t even care that I’m stuck in this room with you right now, but I what I do care about is my freaking sanity , and if you don’t quit that relentless squawking that you call singing, I’m going to seriously lose it!” I rambled, my voice growing in volume as I released my anger. While the boy in front of me regained his composure, I simply plopped back down into my seat and dropped my head into my hands, praying that other people would start filing into the classroom soon so that I wouldn’t have to keep dealing with this guy.
I guessed about 20 minutes had passed before the bell rang, followed by the sound of shoes shuffling into the classroom. Luckily, the tawny-eyed boy had since returned to my ex-desk at the back of the room after my outburst, so I had been left alone to calm down and compose myself before I faced my classmates.
I slowly lifted my head up from my hands, and glanced around at the people coming into the classroom, smiling at some and returning a few brief greetings - but the faces that I wanted to see hadn’t appeared yet, and I somehow knew that they wouldn’t be appearing through that door anytime soon.
My face fell with disappointment, but was quickly replaced with a small smile as I saw my favourite teacher enter the room with the register in his hand. Mr Karasuma strode confidently into our classroom with the same blank expression that he always held, before casting a fleeting glance around the room and quickly taking attendance.
Everyone then settled down into their desks and stopped their chattering; I was fortunate enough to have been sitting in one of the unoccupied desks at the front, so I didn’t have to suffer the embarrassment of being asked to move from someone else’s desk.
“Hello class, welcome back to school,” Mr Karasuma began, “I hope you’ve all had a good rest and are ready to put in lots of hard work this year.” At that, the whole class groaned but were quickly silenced again by a brief glare from our teacher. “As some of you may have noticed, we have a new student sitting with us today. He’s a transfer student, and his name is Karma Akabane - actually Karma, how about you come to the front of the classroom and tell us about yourself?”
The boy in question stood up calmly and gave a shrug, before sauntering to the front of the room and standing next to the teacher’s desk. He cast an almost unnoticeable smirk in my direction, and then opened his mouth to begin talking.
“Yo, so as you’ve heard, my name is Karma and my hobbies are…. Well, you’ll all just have to get to know me better to find out.” With that, he flashed everyone a charming smile and most of the girls blushed and began to whisper excitedly to each other. Hell, even some of the guys began to talk enthusiastically about our new classmate - but I could see through that fake exterior of his, and I knew what a sadistic, harassing asshole he really was.
He turned to me and his grin widened even further, only causing my scowl to deepen as he gave a small wave and strolled back to his– sorry, my desk. Well, at least I now had a name for this grade A douchebag so that I no longer had to call him ‘asshole’ in my head. My eyes snapped back to the front of the classroom as Mr Karasuma cleared his throat to capture our attention once again.
“So, I’m going to need a volunteer to stick with Karma here and make him feel welcome. You know the drill: show him around, introduce him to people, basically just try to get him used to our system as quickly as possible.” Before he could even finish speaking, several enthusiastic hands shot into the air - honestly, I don’t know how he has fooled so many people already, almost everyone wanted to be that one lucky person that would stick by his side for most of the year as he got used to the school.
Obviously I kept my hand down, as I wasn’t too keen on subjecting myself to a year of torture. Our teacher’s eyes scoured the room in search for a suitable volunteer (or in my eyes, a sacrifice), until they landed on me. Don’t you dare I thought, pleading with my eyes to my favourite teacher.
“Nagisa, you will be in charge of taking care of Karma and getting him settled in. I expect you to be polite, and to set a good example for what our expectations are at this school.” My jaw fell open as the school bell rang once more. I sat completely still in my seat while the others stood up and filed out of the classroom. This had to be a joke. A light punch to my shoulder pulled me out of my state of shock, and I looked up to see Karma standing before me, grinning like a Cheshire cat with eyes that were practically sparkling.
“Come on Nagisa , we don’t want to be late for our first class,” he said with a wink. I reluctantly stood up from my seat and began to mentally prepare myself for what will surely be a year of hell. “Cheer up dude, at least we have each other!” I stomped out of the classroom clutching my bag, not even needing to glance up to see that his stupid smirk hadn’t left his face. Damn. I hate this guy.