In These Shoes

By Tragic Lullaby

In no time at all


Some people are obsessed with singers, some people with chocolate, some people with shoes and some people with fame. Not to mention money, which my best friend Hotaru Imai was addicted to. I had no addiction to any of these; except maybe an icing of chocolate and a slight whiff of money. No, I was a maniac, a masochist my friends called me.

I fell into an obsession of sport.

It was a funny thing really, because I used to be the laziest ass of a child on the face of the earth. My friends used to tell me that my butt was a completely separate entity when I ran, which is simple words meant that my butt was too big and that it wobbled when I tried to coordinate the movement called running. I'd sit there, draw a bit, play the piano a bit, ice skate a bit, do school. I wasn't academically talented, so it primary I was lazy and stupid, worthless really. I don't know what changed, I think it was in grade seven when I got involved in the swimming carnival really team. I had always been a good backstroker. I also tried out the soccer teams and netball teams; both at which I sucked, big time.

And then, in high school, out of some small crazy mind blank, I joined the rowing team. Stupid, stupid, stupid. Rowing was a sport for the popular sporty people. Me? I was a nobody; that was what they called the group that I sat with. It suited me too, lazy people needed to be nobodies unless they were amazingly pretty and good academically and could sew a button onto a shirt without stabbing themselves with the end of the needles about twenty times. There was actually a subject called textiles where you made clothes! But anyway, my point is that I wasn't any of these.

I, unfortunately, came from a family where rowing was in the blood. I remember sitting on the shores of the river when I was little, reading a book or playing gameboy, while my aunt raced down the river. I wasn't very interested in all this back then. My step grandmother rowed, my mother rowed, my father would tell me stories about how he rowed around a harbour when he was little all by himself while his fat lazy relatives sat around in the boat going, "Oh look, row closer over there, I want to look at that."

So I sort of shocked myself when I joined rowing.

I soon learnt that rowing was another word for pain and suffering. In a race, ever since you row those first twenty strokes at high power, you begin to realise that your breathing is fast and shallow and that your legs ache like…well, they hurt like hell. It isn't like a marathon run where they "hit a wall" during some time in their insane run. No, it is an ever growing abyss of pain, it just gets worse and worse until you finally hit the end.

When you do finish the race, you thank god that you are still alive, even though all you can think about is your dying legs and the fact that you can't breathe.

So I started to join more sports, like basketball, maybe even hockey. My only problem was this; I started to realise that everyone was falling in and out of love, while I was stuck growing muscles like a weight lifter.

As soon as I got something everyone else had, they got something even more.

I was always one step behind, losing the race.

This world hated me.

Gakuen Alice was a school for the rich, the smart, the beautiful, the popular and the sporty. And the insane, but nobody really counted them in. I had just begged and begged my mum to let me stay at my old school where they had a good rowing program and where I had friends. I wound up here because mum wanted me to have more opportunities in sport and academics. Lovely women, but seriously had no brains and did not think of her daughter's social life; because yes, I had found someone to crush on back at my old school. That was now twenty hours away and the chances that I would ever see him again were like, one to a thousand and one.

Today was the first day of my transfer; did I mention that this place was a boarding school? My parents must've wanted to get rid of me. I remembered the last morning I had with them; I was going to a basketball game and I was complaining how there was never any yogurt in the fridge when I needed it. Instead I had to eat soggy cereal because I had just recently gotten my braces on. And so the cereal got caught in my braces. I hated soggy cereal. I hated braces as well.

At the moment, I was locked away in a classroom with thirty-two rich, smart, beautiful, popular, sporty and insane students, thirty-three if you count the teacher. "Ahem," nobody looked up as the teacher rolled that phlegm. "Ahem," twice if you must. People were starting to pay attention, the teacher beamed, poor old coot, "Everybody, this is Mikan Sakura, she just moved to Tokyo from Hiroshima. Please make her feel welcome here as I'm sure she is feeling very lost at the moment." I wasn't feeling lost, I knew where the exit was and boy oh boy; I wanted to get out.

The stares were on me now. I gave a little bow, "Please be kind to me." I walked down to my seat in silence, beside a guy, its seems, who was sleeping under a manga book. I liked manga as well; and I dared hope we might be friends. Who was I kidding? At lunch, I decided, I'll find some sport clubs, hopefully rowing and basket—

"Excuse me," a preppy voice interrupted my thoughts and I rolled my eyes. I hated this kind of person. "Excuse me, I'm Sumire Shouda, President of the Natsume and Ruka fanclub." Get on with it girl. "I was wondering, what are you good at?"

"Pardon?" I asked, confused, finally looking at the person. She had green eyes and sort of curly permed green black hair; she was pretty, I'd admit to that.

"Well, to come to Gakuen Alice, you must be very good at something, like beyond a normal person," the permy haired witch said. "Otherwise you don't belong here. Everyone here is here because they want to perfect one of their talents. So what's yours?"

"What are you here for then, Princess Perm?"

The so-called Princess Perm flicked her permy hair, "I am here for beauty. I hope to be a five star model when I grow up, or maybe a singer, or maybe a musician, or an actor!" Oh wonderful, I had already met Miss Princess Preppy of the Preppy Perm World full of Beautiful Princesses. Typical.

I had to keep a control over my smart arse mouth before I got myself into trouble, "Ah, I see, well then, I hope you have a nice day." I turned away from her, indicating that this conversation was finished.

"I hope you have--- hey wait! I'm not finished with you yet," dammit, I was so close to fooling her into pissing off. "Firstly, you have not told me why the hell you are here, secondly, don't call me Perm, and thirdly," a wild fire seemed to have sparked in her eyes, "You are sitting next to Natsume Hyuuga! I can't possibly forgive you!" Natsume, wasn't that the name she mentioned before?

"So?" I shrugged my shoulders, "I don't even know the person, I was told to sit here, I'm calling you permy because of your hair and because I've forgotten you name. Lastly," I raised my chin, "It's none of your business why I came here, Princess Perm. Go scuttle back to your little pack of preps who seem to be glaring at me from behind, and tell them I do not appreciate the staring." This is what I meant about my smart arse mouth.

Princess Perm turned a range of colours, it was quite amusing to watch, she started off pale, slowly turning blue, which became a pinkish colour, which deepened into red and finally it settled for a nice magenta…or maroon, who cares about the difference. "You think you are so smart, Mikan Sakura," she hissed with rage, "Your mouth will get you into trouble you won't be able to climb out of one day. I'd watch your back if I were you. Stay away from Natsume and Ruka." With a huff, a stomp of the foot and a flick of the hair she waltzed on back to her little entourage. Touchy, touchy. I grumbled about preps for a while whilst slamming down my books onto the table.

"Could you be any louder?" an irritated voice grumbled from beside me. I flicked around, realising that my seating partner had awoken. He lifted the manga from his face and stared at me.

Oh lordy, lordy.

It was clear I was not going to survive for very long in this enviroment; the guy next to me had beautifully messy black hair, which I was trying my best to resist combing my fingers through, tantalizing red eyes, which were the most captivating eyes I had ever seen, a well-shaped tanned face. Oh my god, save me from good looking people. I had a hatred for handsome guys, because they made me want to do things that I did not want to do. They also made me extremely jealous. I hated them as I admired them. Either I was going to have to kill this person, arrange for a different seating plan or just jump off a cliff, or die, right here, right now. "Who the hell are you?" The guy asked in desirable voice. It was as cold as ice and just as bored though.

"Mikan Sakura, your new seat partner," I responded acidly. This was turning into a staring competition; I was not going to lose. Not going to lose, not going to lose, notgoingtolose, notgoingto—shit, I looked away, scowling. I hated losing, and I had never lost a staring competition since I was in grade seven, which was three years ago now. I could see a smirk being drawn across the bastard's face; he knew he had one.

"Hn, your pretty good at staring competitions…for a girl," That husky voice was driving me up the wall. "Best I've come across."

"Oh? I guess you haven't met many girls then," I said smugly.

"I've never lost a staring competition," Oh ho, so I was talking to the Mister Staring Champion himself. What a loser.

"So you came to Gakuen Alice to perfect your staring hmm? And become the Champion of the Staring Matches, hmm?" I said in a mockingly serious voice, "Wow, how incredible."

"What about yourself?" He drawled, rolling his eyes, "Sarcasm will get you soooo far. You could star of Sarcastic Brats TV specials; they'll even make movies of you and your sarcastic, no brainer comments. I'm sitting beside a future star. Can I get you autograph? I can play this game too, idiot," he said coldly, "What the hell is a stupid girl like you really here for?"

Grr, so it all came down to this, what you are here for. These people seriously had no life. I put on a woeful face, "Because my parents don't love me and they sent me here in hopes that I might be able to string together stupid and jerk together in a string, when I really just want to be back home playing with my washing machine, learning to fly planes and the rest as they will say, will be history. What about you?" Natsume rolled his eyes again, "Your eyeballs are going to fall out of their sockets if you keep doing that." I told him.

"You are one screwed up kid. Whatever, I'm here because my parents are greedy people and they want to make money out of my talent for dancing so they can retire and live somewhere in Australia, maybe on the coast, with kangaroos as pets," my eyes widened at his story.

"Are you serious?"

"No," he snorted, "Neither were you. But I don't care what you are here for, so long as you just leave me alone." He put his manga back on his face, and fell asleep again.

I just sat there; I knew what he meant.

Friendship? Denied.

By the next morning I had joined the basketball club, the rowing team, the athletics team and the group of marathon runners. I was back in the boarding house, trying to find where the porridge was. "What are you doing?" said a drowsy love god voice. Yes, the kitchen was shared in the boarding house even if the boys had a separate dorm to the girls. I gritted my teeth, cocky bastard, I was trying to avoid him.

"Do you have any idea where the porridge is?" I forced the words out of my throat.

"They don't have porridge here," he raised his eyebrow, "Why?"

"Fine, eggs, is there any eggs around here?" I prayed for there to be eggs.

"Imai just ate the last ones," he pointed to a stoic girl who was sitting next to the class president.

I groaned, and much to my joy a robot wheeled over. Yes, robot, I told you this school was completely impossible. "Mikan Sakura," it chanted in a metallic voice.

"Yes dorm mother?" I asked.

"I have received a not from your parents that you are to eat soggy cereal because of your new braces."

No way. Unfortunately, I wasn't the only person to hear this as Hyuuga was here and an entire hoard of preps had just entered the kitchen. I heard a laugh, like the scrapping of nails against the blackboard, "Did you hear that?" Princess Perm had arrived. "Sakura has to eat soggy cereal. Poor thing!" Yes poor me, no need to announce it to the entire world.

So here I now was, my face scrunched up, looking down at the soggy pieces of mush floating around in milk. Ew, I closed my eyes, yuck. "Hey," an entrancing voice called to me. An angel? I looked up into the purple eyes of Imai Hotaru, "Don't make that face, it's disgusting." She plonked down her tray opposite to mine and sat down, much to my surprise. "I'm Hotaru Imai, I'm an Inventor, that's why I came to Gakuen Alice."

"Mikan Sakura, I guess you could sort of say I came here for sport," I said, embarrassed, "But everyone makes a big deal about what people are here for and what they do, I don't understand it."

"Because this is a special school, for special people. All these people have been here since they were young and so the only thing they know is to classify people because of what they are good at," Hotaru informed me, "That's how they feel safe. Having someone question that makes them feel uncomfortable."

I looked down at my soggy breakfast. I sort of understood now, I had felt the same by being lazy when I was little and not doing anything adventurous. But isn't life about taking risks and leaving comfort zones?

As soon as the last class of the day had ended I was on my feet, and the cocky jerk seemed to be in a rush too. "What, have to go and dance already?" I smirked, I had just sat through a day with no conversation and therefore I was irritated and bored. "You'd better hurry, don't want to miss your dancing lesson."

"I thought you needed to learn how to string 'I am stupid' together," Natsume returned, "Are you so into learning that you're immediately jumping up after class to ask for some one-on-one sessions with the Perverted Freak Narumi?" Yowch. I glared at him. "See you around Polka. Maybe you should ask Narumi if you can go to his office in the morning so he can cook porridge for you."

I was going to punch his stupid face.

Before both of us knew, we were running in the same direction. He was pretty fit and fast, must be all those dancing lessons. I was beginning to puff and that was when he noticed that I was following him, or it looked like it. "Idiot, the offices aren't this way," he shot back at me, "What are you, a stalker?"

I scowled at him, "I'm going this way, Hyuuga, do you have a problem with it, dancer boy?" Actually, I was headed for the gym to catch the rower's bus over to the river. I had to be fast or I'd miss it. I forgot Hyuuga. I got there just in the nick of time.

"Oh, it's the newbie Mikan," it was one of the coaches, "And Coach Natsume as well! I knew they'd both make it." Coach…Natsume? I rounded on the handsome boy, glaring with all my brainpower.

"Why didn't you tell me this, jerk?" I snapped, I just couldn't get away from him! "I never knew you were a rowing coach!"

"What about you, polka? You are too skinny to be a rower, rowers need to be strong and you don't look like you have one ounce of muscle in you," he replied coldly, "You'll die within the first week."

"I used to row with my old school!"

"This isn't your kind old, weak school anymore. Gakuen Alice means hard training, fool," he snapped. "You are too weak to row, go find something else to do or leave Gakuen Alice."

I was on the verge of tears, how dare he! "I hate you," I snarled, tightening my grip on my bag, and I stomped onto the bus. Oh this was a great start to school, great. I would show him who he was dealing with.

Mikan, sweetie, how is school? Made any friends? How many sport clubs have you joined? Are the teachers good? I want to hear everything, - Mum, Yuka.

I rubbed my eyes as I looked at my cell phone. Stupid mother, but I couldn't worry her, that'd be a bad thing to do. She'd rock up to school in her BMW and storm into my class, demanding to know if I was safe.

Mum, school is horrible, because schools can never be good. I have sort of made a friend, her name is Hotaru, and I'm sitting next to this jerk called Natsume Hyuuga though. I've joined four so far, and the teachers are okay :] – love ya, Mikan.

My phone buzzed only a few seconds later. Man, had mum gotten even faster at texting?

Try to ignore the boy, that's my advice. Aunt Miki and her family came over to dinner yesterday. I'm sending you over some new runners that I found in the store today, I know that your old runners are starting to fall apart even if you say they aren't. :] Talk to me if anything is wrong? Okay? - 3 Mum

I smiled, new runners, new friends, new enemies and a new life. Natsume Hyuuga, I'll show you how hard Mikan Sakura can work, then we'll see who is weaker. I opened my mailbox and found a package, addressed to me from my mother. Gleeful, I skipped up to my room and tore it open. I opened it up and I swear they were sparkling, the shoes that were.

They weren't flashy but they looked like they could run forever. Runners; just like me. They were part of me now.

Whatever I did now, wherever my life took me it would be in these shoes.


I've noticed that whenever I write in Mikan's point of view, I make her attitude like mine :[ Oh dear.

Anyway, yes, I am sort of writing down what I was like. I was indeed a very lazy child who could not run for shit. And yes, I did join rowing and yes, it is extremely painful. Haha.

There will be romance, I promise.

Anyway, please read and review.

3

Tragic Lullaby