I'll Be Your Guardian Angel

Chapter 1

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"Come on, pretty boy, it's show time."

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SHPOV

I sighed as I stepped into the school again, glaring at everything around me.

"Come on, Shuichi," I heard someone say cheerfully beside them. I turned to glare up at the person, and the redhead just grinned back, placing a hand on my shoulder.

"Calm down, just a few more weeks of this and we're done," he assured me with a grin.

I rolled my violet eyes. "Whatever, Hiro," I growled, walking a bit faster.

"Oh, don't give me that," he called to my back.

"I will!" I called behind me. Hiro laughed, holding his backpack straps as he jogged after his friend.

"What is wrong with you today?" he asked as he caught up to me, his head tilted to the side.

"Nothing," I grumbled back in reply, stopping in front of my locker to open it with the combination.

"You're lying," he laughed, high-fiving someone as they passed before he turned back to me. "Something is wrong."

"Just leave it alone, Hiro," I grumbled, hearing a pack of girls walk behind me, whispering.

A couple of them said, "Hi, Hiro," before they all began to giggle again and walk away a bit faster. Hiro waved after them, but I pulled him out of his daze by nearly slamming my locker door right in his face, growling.

"Get a grip, they're just girls," he said, rolling his eyes as we began to walk towards his locker.

"That you always get," I snapped under my breath as we stopped beside Hiro's locker, where he quickly pulled out a couple of books and dropped off one from in his bag. He shut it, turning to look at me.

"I'm not the only one," he said, rolling his eyes.

"Oh yeah?" I growled, raising an eyebrow.

"Yeah," he said with a nod. "There's Sakuma and Yuki and Seguchi and – "

"Hiro, stop, I get it," I growled with a sigh, beginning to walk with him towards our first class together. "At least you're not always swarmed like them, though…"

"Like what? Like that?" Hiro asked, jutting his thumb over towards a bench as we passed. I could see through the small pack of girls to see a blond sitting on the bench, his tiger eyes not looking at any of the girls, just looking to the other blond that was about a foot away on the bench, smiling at him as he spoke.

I rolled my eyes. "At least they're ignoring the girls," I grumbled, jealous.

"I ignore them, too!" Hiro said in defense and I turned to look at him, raising an eyebrow.

"Well…not all of them…" he murmured quietly, looking off to the side.

"That's what I thought," I grumbled, rolling my eyes as we walked into our first period class, crossing to sit down in desks in the back. "You did my homework, right?"

"'Course I did," Hiro said, pulling out a paper from his backpack to hand it to me.

"Thanks," I smiled as I took it, grinning at him.

"I'm surprised you've made it so long in high school, Shuichi-kun," Hiro said as he rolled his eyes.

"It's actually all 'cause of you, Hiro-kun," I told him with a grin as I looked over at him. "If it weren't for you, I would have failed many years ago."

Hiro just rolled his eyes. "You say that," he said with a laugh. "But you still wouldn't get failing grades if you tried."

It was my turn to roll my eyes. "Hiro, I'm not that smart."

Hiro was about to respond when he looked up at hearing someone calling his name, and I looked to see someone walking into the room, looking around before he spotted Hiro and came over to him.

"Suguru," Hiro said with a nod. "What's up?"

"Something wonderful. Something grand!"

I rose an eyebrow at hearing this.

"Care to share?" I asked, hoping he would tell us what this was about.

"I might have gotten a breakthrough with my cousin," Suguru told us, a wide grin on his face. My jaw dropped, my eyes going wide with shock.

"Seriously?" Hiro asked, a small grin coming to his face.

"Hi, Hiro," a girl said as she passed his desk with a giggle, and Hiro just waved without looking away from Suguru.

"Yes, seriously! He told me he wants to meet with the three of us either today or tomorrow after school to see if we're 'the right material'."

I began to laugh. "C'mon, Suguru. We are the material."

"That just depends on if it's a crappy print or not," Hiro pointed out, and I glared as he and Suguru began to laugh.

"It'll be fine, Shuichi," Suguru assured me as he laughed, pulling up a chair so that he could sit between us and talk to both at the same time, since his chair was on the other side of Hiro. "So, which song are we going to play for him if he asks us to?"

YPOV

This was getting rather bothersome. Girls were swarming and flocking behind me everywhere I went. Usually, I didn't let it get to me, because I was much too nice to tell them to go the hell away.

I looked over at my best friend and offered him a smile as he sat on the bench. He was telling me about what had happened last night at dinner with his girlfriend – my older sister – that had made the meal turn out so well into his favor.

I laughed as he said that the waiter had spilled coffee all over him, but that my sister had actually thought it was funny and liked him more because of how he handled the situation so calmly and rationally.

"You two really are meant for each other, Touma-kun," I said with a laugh.

"You really think so, Eiri-kun?" he asked me, smiling.

"Yes, I think so. Tatsuha will think so, as well," I said with a smile, looking at my watch. "Well, time to go to class."

Touma chuckled, beginning to stand from the bench along with me. The girls fawned behind us as we began to walk towards our first period class, and I smiled over at him as we walked, completely ignoring the girls calling my name. Touma was doing the same.

"I have to interview a band either today or tomorrow after school," he told me as we walked. "Would you like to come with me?"

I shrugged. "I might have to work, myself," I said with a soft sigh.

"What do you mean?" he asked me, sounding confused. "I thought you were finished?"

"Rikka-chan might have corrections for me today," I mused with a shrug. "But I don't know if she'll have had a chance to even work on those…" I sighed. Her life was much too stressful for someone my age…

"Ah, I see," Touma said as we turned the corner to go into a classroom, the flock of girls finally seeming to disperse. I breathed a sigh of relief, smiling over at him. "You do your homework?"

"Don't I always?" I asked as we went to our desks, Touma taking one near the back, and I began to set my bag down on the desktop for a moment, standing beside the seat.

"Good morning, Eiri-kun," I heard a voice hum behind me and I turned to see a girl looking up at me with a small, sheepish smile, looking up at me with her tiger eyes, blonde hair falling around her face.

"Morning to you, too, Rikka-chan," I said with a smile as I moved to give the girl a hug. I felt her wince against me, but I let it slide. She almost always did that. She hugged me back after a moment with one of her arms, and as I began to pull away she lifted up the folder that she had in her hands up so that I could see it better.

"I have those corrections for you," she said with a small smile.

"Well, thank you," I said with a smile. "My publisher will be especially pleased."

She smiled back up at me. "You're welcome," she said as I pulled her into a soft hug, gently kissing the top of her head.

I heard someone clear their throat from the front of the classroom and I pulled away to glare at who it was, and, much to my embarrassment, found the teacher watching me with a raised eyebrow, tapping her foot. Rikka squeaked slightly, a blush rising on her cheeks.

I bowed slightly in apology before I moved to sit down once releasing Rikka, who sat in a desk to my left. I heard a few girls giggle near the front and rolled my eyes.

"Looks like you'll be working after school then, Eiri," Touma said over my shoulder, and I nodded, slumping slightly in my seat. "Eiri, that's bad posture."

"Oh, shut it, Touma," I said with a roll of my eyes, turning enough so that I could see him. "I'm fine right where I am."

He just chuckled and sat back, and I waited, settling back in my seat for class to start.

SHPOV

After Suguru moved to go back to his chair, I watched as the two blonds of the school walked into the class, the shorter of the two sitting in the desk in front of me. I rolled my eyes as a girl came up behind the blond that was still standing, and looked over at Hiro as he leaned over towards me.

"I didn't know that Suichi and Yuki were together?" he hissed at me as Yuki kissed the top of the girl's head, a confused look on Hiro's face.

I shrugged. "Well, they have known each other for years," I hissed back, sitting back in my seat.

Hiro let out a huff, crossing his arms over his chest as he glared slightly at Yuki.

"Aww, someone's got a crush!" I hissed back after a moment, grinning. Hiro grumbled, looking away from all of us to glare down at his desk. I watched Suichi and Yuki until the teacher came in, chuckling slightly as the teacher cleared her throat.

Suichi blushed and moved to sit down in the seat in front of Hiro, and I noticed that Touma had sat down in front of me. We sat in silence as the class began, but my eyes kept on slipping back to the company president who was sitting in front of me, watching attentively. He was quite clever for someone his age…he'd started his own record deal a year ago with his own band, which I, myself, was well into.

I was amazed that someone so young had founded such a large company…and I was even more amazed that my band was actually getting the chance to be part of this new, already-famous company. I hoped.

I didn't hear anything the teacher said, fantasizing about all of the different things that Bad Luck – our band – would be able to do if we were signed to the label. I might actually get a girl, too.

I was smiling to myself by the end of the class, in which Hiro walked with me to second period. We had all the same classes together except for my – ew – art class. During that period he had some advanced class that I had no interest in being in. I felt sorry for Hiro, though, if we did get signed onto this record company…his parents wanted him to go into med school, but he didn't want to have anything to do with it. His parents were nice people until you mentioned our band. They didn't seem to be all that worried about it when Hiro and I started a couple years ago, using their basement as our 'homebase.'

…but then we got a keyboardist and started to get serious. His parents loathed that fact. They actually tried to shun him away from us, so that he would still 'want' to be a doctor. When we mentioned that it was possible that we could start getting into gigs to play for an actual crowd, they went off the deep end, just like they had when they found out that Hiro's older brother, Yuuji, wanted to be an actor.

Hiro was actually living with me at the moment with my parents because his parents told him that he wasn't their son if he planned on pursuing his 'ridiculous dream of guitars and keyboards' that I had apparently shoved into his head. They'd thrown him out of the house, disowned him, telling him never to come back unless he was planning on becoming a doctor. Needless to say, he hadn't gone back.

He just wanted to finish high school so we could get out and go to our job…which we would hopefully achieve right after school.

I began to think of all the possibilities there were…all of the things that could change after we got signed…we'd be able to actually record songs, sell cd's, and go to actual concert gigs, and not just play at night clubs where people were just mingling around with each other…we could actually go somewhere where the people were actually there to see us.

I went through the entire day thinking of this, not really knowing what I was doing. All throughout the day Hiro would hand me notes he'd taken for me, and I would just take them with a nod.

I only really came to my senses when I looked up at the clock and saw that there were five minutes left of school. Five minutes!

I began to nearly bounce out of my seat, and Hiro, who sat behind me, put a hand securely on my shoulder to hold me still.

When the bell rang I whooped and shouted in joy, jumping up and doing a little dance by my chair. Hiro rolled his eyes.

"Come on, pretty boy, it's show time."

YPOV

My fingers quickly clicked across the keys, others sitting beside me watching me write. Even though I never allowed them to see what it was I was writing, I guess I couldn't stop them watching me.

Only Touma was allowed to sit beside me in our last period computer class, because I knew that since he owned a company of his own that I could trust him to not tell anyone my novel's secrets.

I was working quickly, trying to finish the edits that Rikka had given me earlier so I could pick her up and take her with me, momentarily, to the studio like Touma had asked and get that out of the way so I could take her out to a movie.

She had looked like she needed a break, and she had looked so tired, oh so tired, when I saw her before this period, but she said she'd tell me about it later…like always.

I worked quickly, and was just finishing the last word change when I heard the bell ring. With a triumphant smile, I slapped the lid down on my laptop and slipped it into my bag. Beside me, Touma laughed.

"Finish?" he asked me as he stood. I nodded. "That's good. I have to run ahead to the studio. Would you mind stopping on your way there and grabbing me an iced espresso shake from that great coffee house?"

I laughed. "The Starbucks?"

"Yeah, there," he said with a wide smile.

"Sure," I answered with a nod as he slung his backpack onto his shoulder. "I'll get you one."

"Thanks, Eiri! I'll see you in a few minutes!" he called before he ran out of the computer room and down the hallway and out of my sight.

I just shook my head after him, putting my own messenger bag's strap across me as I walked out, slower than him.

I went outside, leaning against a pole just outside the front door to the high school as I waited.

"I hope you haven't been waiting long…"

I turned at hearing her voice, and smiled.

"No, actually, not at all," I said, turning to smile at Rikka as she came over to me, and I put an arm gently around her shoulders. "You look so tired, Rikka…"

"I know…" she murmured softly, leaning against my side as we began to walk down the steps towards the parking lot and my car.

"Did you not sleep well?" I asked her, and she just shook her head.

"My dad was drunk last night again…he was really loud," she said. "Kept me awake all night."

"I see," I replied softly as I brought her to the passenger side of my beloved American Mercedes, opening the door for her. I took her bag and set it in the back seat for her, along with mine, and then closed her door and went around to mine.

"Are you up for some coffee?" I asked her with a grin.

"Oh yes…caffeine sounds wonderful right now," Rikka laughed out as I turned the car on before I began to drive out of the parking lot towards the coffee house.

That's the end of chapter 1. I hope you enjoyed it, and please leave a review!

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters in this story except for Rikka-chan. She is a character of my own creation. All others belong to the creator of Gravitation.