She walked in the pouring rain with her head down, covered in the hood from her overcoat. The music playing in her ears from her IPod drowned out the sound of the heavy rain, the heavy rock beat also cancelling out most of the sounds of the traffic passing her on the street.
Her name was Tanaka Aoi and, due to unforeseen circumstances she was on her way to begin attending Kurogin Gakuin. Unfortunately, as Kurogin was a boys' school and she was going to be there until graduation in two months time, she was going to be spending those two months as Takagi Ichiru.
In preparation for her transformation into a boy, she had put a wig on over her shoulder length brown hair. It was fashionable at present to have slightly longer hair if you were a male teenager, so it was a little shorter than her hair. She found herself constantly wanting to scratch her head; sure that she was developing some kind of allergic reaction to the synthetic hair. She wore baggy black pants with a wallet chain running to her back pocket and hoped that she looked boyish enough to pass for the boy that she was pretending to be.
She was aware that she was to report first thing to Head Teacher Sawatari, who was going to introduce her to her new homeroom teacher. As she approached the gates of the school, she noticed further down, the gates to a girls' school. Wishing that her grandfather was on the board of governors for that school instead of Kurogin, Aoi squared her shoulders as she walked inside the gates.
She was a little early, so as expected, there weren't many students loitering around the quad. She therefore had an unobstructed path into the school. Seeing a caretaker emptying one of the huge bins just inside the front door, she approached the elderly man and asked him for directions to the Head Teacher's office. Thanking him for his help, she made her way in the direction he had indicated.
She passed a couple of stray students on her way. From the look of them – they had well cut short hair and were very tidy – she deduced that they were in some kind of academic club. Pulling the hood further down over her face, she hunched her shoulders, and avoided eye contact. She didn't realise that she looked quite forbidding to them, hidden as she was beneath her hood, but she could hear their mutters and wished that she had left her IPod on after speaking to the caretaker.
She blew out a breath, familiar enough with schools to know that a couple of nerds gossiping would only be the beginning.
She finally reached the teacher's lounge and walked inside. There were several teachers milling around inside and she stood just inside the door, waiting for someone to notice her. She didn't have to wait long.
A man in a track suit stood up and approached her. "Can I help you?"
She nodded. "I'm here to see Head Teacher Sawatari. I'm...Takagi Ichiru," she said. The police had advised her not to allow anyone but the Head Teacher and her homeroom teacher know about the real reason that she was here, for her safety as well as theirs. They had had the bright idea that an all-boys' school was the last place they would look for her.
The teacher nodded and waved her through. He led her to the back of the room to where a man with glasses sat reading paperwork at a desk.
"Head Teacher, this is Takagi Ichiru. He said that he needs to speak to you."
Sawatari looked uncomfortable as he looked at her and stood up. "Takagi," he said gruffly. "You'll be in Class 3-D while you're here. Your teacher is Yamaguichi-sensei. Yamaguchi-sensei!" he called loudly, causing Aoi to jump in surprise.
"Head Teacher Sawatari! What can I do for you?"
The small woman who came to stand beside Aoi had long black hair, which was tied up in two pig tails on either side of her head, with round glasses and was wearing a red track suit.
"Yamaguchi-sensei, this is your new student, Takagi. You remember, the one that I told you about," he added, staring meaningfully at her.
The small woman looked at him confusedly for a moment. The Head Teacher glared at her until a look of realisation came over her face. "Oh, that one," she said, winking conspiratorially at Sawatari, who merely glared at her more fiercely.
"Don't you worry Head Teacher, I'll look after Takagi. He's one of my precious students now."
Sawatari simply shook his head with resignation and advised, "I think you should get going to class before those delinquents tear the classroom apart."
Yamaguchi looked as though she would object to the man's words until she saw the confused look on Aoi's face.
"Yes," she agreed, taking Aoi by the arm and leading her out of the teacher's lounge. "Let us get to class and I'll introduce you to the others."
Aoi nodded, but didn't speak, which left the teacher plenty of time to chatter aimlessly as they walked across the quad into a separate building. Aoi listened absently; Yamaguchi didn't act like any teacher that she had ever met before. If she didn't know better, she would have thought that she wasn't much older than her own seventeen years.
They finally reached the end of a long corridor and came to abrupt halt at a sliding door. Yamaguchi turned to Aoi and grabbed her firmly by both arms.
"I know you might find it a little intimidating being the only girl in the class. Now, the boys might seem a little rough around the edges, but believe me, they're all good boys deep down. You don't need to worry about anything while you're in my class. You're also my precious student now and I'll protect you no matter what."
Aoi stared at her. She couldn't reconcile this small woman with her own past experience of teachers. Though she had had some decent teachers over the years, she was sure that none of them would have been offering to protect her!
"This is hard for me," she admitted quietly. "I don't really want to be here. When I'm around, people get hurt. How much do you really know about why I'm here?"
Yamaguchi looked at her sympathetically. "I know that you saw something that someone should never have to experience and that you're hiding here for your own safety."
"I think that my grandfather was wrong to send me here," Aoi explained. "Look, you seem really nice but when I'm around, bad things happen and I don't want anything to happen to you or your students because of me."
"Your grandfather is on the board of governors for this school and the superintendent agreed to keep you here, safe. Do you want your grandfather to worry?" the teacher asked her.
Aoi flinched at the question. She had lived with her grandfather since she was ten years old, when he had taken her in following the death of her parents in a car accident. If there was one person in the world that she would do anything for, it was him. Hence the reason, she hadn't flat out refused to come to Kurogin when he had suggested it.
"No, I don't," she confirmed quietly.
Yamaguchi nodded decisively. "Then you let me worry about things and you just concentrate on settling in."
"Thank you, Yamaguchi-sensei," Aoi said, bowing to the older woman, who waved her hand dismissively.
"You don't need to be so formal. Call me Yankumi," she advised. "It's the nickname my cute students gave me."
"Okay," Aoi agreed slowly. She stared after the teacher as she turned around and opened the door to the classroom behind her. For the first time, Aoi noticed the loud talking coming from the other side, and she flinched at the heightened sound now that the door was open.
"Good morning, everyone!" Yankumi called cheerfully as she walked inside. There was a collective call back of 'Good morning, Yankumi' from her students.
Aoi's eyebrows shot up as she got her first look at the boys in the classroom. These were Yankumi's 'cute' students? They lounged lazily in their seats looking like stereotypical teenage delinquents. They wore variations on the black uniform the school had, most of them wearing their blazers over various t-shirts.
"Everyone, we have a new student who will be joining us until graduation. This is Takagi Ichiru," Yankumi introduced, gesturing to Aoi to come through the door.
Taking a deep breath, Aoi squared her shoulders, tightening her grip on her school bag as she walked through the door. She bowed her head slightly to the boys in the class and walked over to stand beside Yankumi.
"Takagi, take a seat and we'll get started," Yankumi directed, indicating an empty seat near the back of the class.
Bowing her head in Yankumi's general direction, Aoi made her way to the empty seat. She could feel the boys' curious stares, but was careful not to make eye contact with anyone. She knew teenage boys well enough that it didn't take much to set off their testosterone time bombs; they got quite easily offended at even the smallest perceived slight.
She took off her overcoat and hung it over the back of her chair. Quickly taking a seat, she slipped her bag over the hook on the side of the desk after first taking out a notebook and pen.
Before all of this had happened, she had been a straight 'A' student, excelling in all of her classes and though being at a boys' school wasn't ideal for a girl, she was almost happy to be back in a classroom environment, where the routine was blessedly familiar.
"Yo. What's up?"
She stiffened at the voice coming from her right. Here we go, she thought.