AUTHOR's NOTE, 5/10- I went back and edited this. Now we have a better, pimped out version of chapter one. I also corrected some spelling errors. ^^;;
Haruhi stared at the board, squinting to see what was scrawled in dry erase marker at the top. Seeing as she had accidentally left her glasses in the music room, she had been spending the entire day without. So far, she had managed in her other classes, seeing as she sat relatively close to the board, but she was having a bit of trouble in social studies, seeing as she sat in the third to last row.
The bearded professor at the front stepped back, moving to the side so that they could see what he had written. Haruhi squinted again, but still couldn't see it. She normally would have been alright without her classes, seeing as she liked to wear contacts under them, but she had run out of contacts today, so Tamaki had had to run to the general store to get some. Until then, he had told her that she'd have to wear her old glasses.
This was it. She realized that no matter how hard she tried, she more than likely wasn't going to be seeing that board anytime soon unless she moved up front. So, she grabbed her stuff and moved up to one of the desks that was closest to the board--there was an immediate change for the positive.
The words Reality Check were scribbled onto the board, and off to the side were some financial vocabulary words. They had been studying finances for the past week or so, and Haruhi remembered Mr. Yoshima repeatedly telling them that it would all make sense after they entered the reality check program. However, the man had failed to explain what it was the entire time.
The man looked around the room again, and when he was sure that everybody had read what he had written he began to explain. "In the reality check program, you will be assigned a partner from a random grade level, and you will be drawing a random job from the bucket the next day. The goal of the game is to go through all of the booths tomorrow and have money left over."
Oh. In her opinion, it would have made things a lot easier for both of them, the class and the teacher, if he had explained that from the start. Apparently, though, he thought that leaving them all bewildered would help stoke .
Haruhi saw Hikaru and Kaoru whispering to each other out of the corner of her eye, probably discussing who they thought that they might get paired with. As for her, part of her wanted it to be someone from the host club, but the other hand, that could mean embarrassment...Especially if that member was Tamaki, seeing as he would not uncommonly go into what she affectionately called Tamaki breakdown mode.
She suddenly realized that had started talking again while she was staring off into space, so she quickly moved her attention back to the board. "...Your partners will be pulled from their classes to join you on Monday when you go through the program, although you might want to discuss with them in advance before the program starts. You'll be drawing random names in a few minutes, and no trading."
No trading. That was great. With her luck, she would probably get stuck with somebody like Renge for her project and would be unable to trade her misfortune off to anyone else.
Their teacher went back to his desk to get the strips of paper ready, and in that time the class volume level moved back into a low roar again. Hikaru quickly got up, moving to the empty desk next to hers. "So, who do you think you're going to get?", he asked, raising an eyebrow. Kaoru moved to the seat next to his twin, also leaning on the metal bar that attached the chair to the table part of it.
"I don't know...", she started, shrugging and moving a strand of hair out of her eyes, "What about you?"
"I don't know, either...But I hope it's someone from the club." He said. As demonstrated many times before, the twins had an aversion to what and who they considered outsiders our outsider concepts. Therefore, they were, unsurprisingly, hoping for somebody that was part of what they classified as 'us'.
"I second that.", Kaoru added. Before she could respond to what he had said, the teacher strode to the front with the bucket of names and gestured for the twins to return to their seats.
"Alright. Who would like to draw first. Anyone?" He looked around the room. Finally, a girl in the back got up hesitantly, drawing one of the strips of paper. She read it silently, putting it in her pocket and then excitedly whispering to the others that sat around her when she got back to her desk.
Apparently she had gotten a partner that she could tolerate to some degree, maybe Haruhi would, too. At least, she sure hoped so...
"Haruhi, please come forward and draw.", the teacher said, making a sweeping gesture towards the bucket. She crossed her fingers as she put her hand in, digging around in the pile of paper strips until she found one that felt right and shoving it into her pocket.
When she got back to her desk, she opened it–to her deep relief, the name scrawled across it in 's handwriting was familiar. Kyoya Ohtori. Well, at least she knew she wasn't going to fail...However, Kyoya's reaction she did wonder about.
Hikaru quickly moved to the desk next to her, but he was caught by the ever watchful eye of the teacher–again. He snorted, moving back to his original seat after the reprimand.
"You may talk about who you were assigned at the end of class, Hikaru.", he said, crossing his arms across his chest.
"Kaoru, please draw." Kaoru got up, moving fluidly towards the bucket and quickly drawing a strip before sitting back down. Hikaru leaned over in his desk as his twin opened it, frowning. "Oooh." They had clearly gotten an undesirable work partner, because both were frowning as they stared at it.
Who?, Haruhi mouthed, curious.
Kaoru handed the strip to Haruhi under the table; he had been assigned to partner up with Nekozawa-kun. She shrugged, casting him a sympathetic glance before handing the paper back under the desk, along with hers so that they could see who she had gotten.
She watched Hikaru's eyebrows rise sharply; apparently he had jsut finished reading it. He turned to look at her, mouthing, really? Haruhi nodded, and Hikaru passed it back to her. He mouthed something else, too, but she didn't catch it. She'd have to ask him later...
Hikaru was called after two more students, and returned smiling mildly. He held up the strip: Tamaki-Senpai was going to be his partner. She heard Kaoru murmur something about trading under his breath, but Hikaru just shook his head. there was no way that, even if it was allowed, anybody would trade with the fellow that wound up with Nekozawa.
The bell rang, and Haruhi had to admit that the last class of the day had passed much sooner than she had thought that it would. The teacher called something at the trio as they left the door, but at the moment they were more intent on leaving so that they could talk about who they had gotten than anything he had to say.
"Lucky.", Kaoru said, grimacing. Nekozawa-Kun wasn't exactly a very...desirable work partner, seeing as his group had to work in a closet of some sort or at least in the dark, making it nearly impossible to see where you were writing or coloring on your poster or whatever it was you were doing.
"Haruhi's going to get the highest grade in the class.", Hikaru said, grinning, "She's got Kyoya as her partner. You should make him do all the work, you know."
She would get a high grade, she was already pretty sure of that. Seeing as two intelligent people were working on it, the project would surely be a success.
"Really.", Kaoru said, smiling, "Besides, it's the wives that sit back and relax these days, anyway."
Wives? Where did that come from? Haruhi raised an eyebrow, and Kaoru quickly explained.
"In reality check you're playing a married couple. You didn't know that?"
"No. No I didn't.", she said blankly. Well, this would make things a lot more awkward...