Hello random people of the internet, and welcome to my story! I recently watched WataMote in it's entirety and decided that if, by the end of the anime, she hadn't made a significant amount of progress, I was going to... help her along a bit. Whether you like it or not, here it is; the first chapter of "Who Cares?"
Disclaimer: I do not own Watamote. If I did, Tomoko might not be as much of a cosmis plaything. Or she may be more of one, I dunno.
'Dammit dammit dammit! What the hell am I doing!? It's already my second year of high school and I haven't even made a single friend!'
"Tomoko, are you awake? If you don't hurry up, you won't have time to eat breakfast before you leave," Hahaoya Kuroki calls from the other side of the door. The short girl with long, unkempt hair just offers something to get her mother to leave her alone while she berates herself mentally.
'Ugh, it's been a year and my only friends are Yuu-chan and my kid brother... I don't even think he likes me that much, either...' Tomoko complains to herself, pulling her uniform on. When she's ready, she starts down the stairs but freezes when she hears something she hasn't heard in a while.
"Haha, no way, really?" A shiver runs down Tomoko's spine as she hears her little brother, Tomoki Kuroki, the constantly brooding pain in the ass, laughing.
"What's going on down here!?" Tomoko yells as she runs down the rest of the stairs to see what sort of major catastrophe is happening to make Tomoki nervous enough to laugh. 'It's gotta be a crazed gunman or something, a-and he's just trying to keep him calm with humor or something!'
However, halfway down Tomoko loses her footing, sending her small form flying down the rest of the stairs. 'This is it, I'm doomed. It's the end for me, I'm going to die a lonely, pathetic virgin with no friends who's own brother doesn't even like her. At least I'm dying from something normal and not the vaccuum cleaner.'
With her eyes clamped shut, she feels the sudden stop at the end on the staircase signal her death. However, instead of the cold embrace she was imagining it's really very warm, and it feels good and oddly familiar.
"Umm, Miss Tomoko? Are you ok?" The small girl hear's a voice from outside, a deepish man's voice, like one you'd expect to hear from a voice actor. 'Is this the voice of God? If so, plaese talk a whole lot more!'
"You can just ignore her, she's a pest," Tomoki's voice breaks through the pleasantness of the mood with an earth shattering revelation. 'Oh no, did Tomoki die too!? Did I land on him and break his neck and kill us both!?'
"Well, ok then, I'm going to put you down now," God's voice says, and Tomoko feels herself being lowered considerably. 'Down? Do you mean Hell!? Am I going to Hell for killing my little brother!? No, please God, I didn't mean to I swear! Don't put me in Hell!'
"Tomoko!" the girl's mother snaps, cutting through her crying and flailing and moans about not wanting to suffer eternal damnation for her clumsiness. Tomoko stops and opens her eyes when she feels her feet touch the ground and sees a large, blonde haired, brown eyed, lightly bearded man in front of her.
"G-God?" Tomoko says questioningly. "I thought you were supposed to be old and white haired..."
"No, I'm not God," the man says, a little embarrased.
"Tomoko, this is Seth," Hahaoya says through clenched teeth. "He is a foreign exchange student who will be staying with us for the next six months. Say hello."
"Wh-what? Why is he staying here?" Tomoko asks, unaware of her lack of manners.
A slap to the back of the head puts Tomoko in line. "Say. Hello."
"H-hi," Tomoko says informally. In response, Seth bows his head, as he did with everyone else he'd met so far.
"Hello, it's nice to meet you. I'll be in your care for now," he says in perfect Japanese. "I'm sorry if my enunciation is poor," he says ironically.
"No, no, it's fine," Tomoko says absently. She notices her school's boy uniform on him. "What grade are you in, exactly?"
"I'm not really sure, the Japanese school system is different from the American one," Seth says with a little laugh.
"He'll be in placed in your class, Tomoko, so you'd better be nice and help him if he has trouble," Hahaoya says.
"Why me?" Tomoko asks.
"Tomoko..." her mother growls.
"Nevermind, ok, I'll do it!" Tomoko says quickly. She grabs a part of Tomoki's breakfast and runs out the door, not wanting to stay in the house any longer, despite her mother yelling after her.
"Sorry about her," Tomoki says. He and Seth had really hit it off, talking about nothing in particular. He had arrived the night before, but Tomoko was locked in her room, so they didn't bother to try and get her down the stairs, given what she very well might have been doing up there. So, Seth and Tomoki just sat and talked for a while that night, and then again in the morning, and it seemed like the two would get along well.
However, there's just one problem.
'Why was he giving her that look?' he asks himself with a vein popping out in his forehead. Seth seemed a little awestruck from Tomoko, but not in the usual, how-can-anyone-be-this-weird type of way. Instead, it seemed like a holy-crap-who-is-this-person look. And not in a bad way, either. It looks to Tomoki like, as Seth rushes out of the house to follow Tomoko to learn the way to the school, the large man is curious, and possibly even interested in his older sister. He's not sure how he feels about that.
'This is going to be annoying.'
...
"Hey," Seth says, his longer strides easily bringing him up beside Tomoko. "I think we started off wrong. Try again?"
'Who is this guy? Why did he have to come to live with us of all people? More importantly, why isn't he making me nervous? Is it because I thought he was God?' "U-umm... yeah, sure," Tomoko says in the same type of voice she would use if nervouse about asking Yuu about something embarrasing.
"Hello, my name is Seth Makarov, and it's nice to meet you, Miss Tomoko Kuroki," Seth says, bowing slightly.
"Well, yeah, actually... j-just Tomoko... is fine," Tomoko says, bowing a little in return. 'Maybe it's because he's foreign?'
"Well, Tomoko, I hope we can have a great year together. If there's anything you'd like to ask about me, go ahead," Seth says good-naturedly. He's trying to seem as polite as possible to the people who'll be hosting him for the next half year.
"N-no, that's fine." 'Hmm... Well, I guess he isn't exactly hot, but he isn't ugly either... He's pretty handsome...'
"So, shall we be on our way?" Seth asks, look towards the direction they were previously walking before stopping for the reintroduction.
"Oh, yeah," Tomoko says, resuming her normal walking speed. Seth kept pace with her, making his strides equal to hers. The rest of the walk to the train was spent in silence, and when they boarded, Tomoko noticed something; or rather, the absence of something.
Ever since the incident with the perverted nagita, Tomoko had a bit of apprehension towards the train. It wasn't that she was concerned that it would happen again or that she thought she might actually get raped, but the memory of the occurance had always been in the back of her mind whenever she got on.
However, this time, there was nothing. No nagging feeling of paranoia, no soul crushing regret. Not even a bit of an unpleasant feeling towards the transport system. Sure, she still remembered the accident, but there was no fear. In fact, she even feels safe. However, she just shrugs it off and starts thinking of ways she might be able to use the fact that she knows the foreign exchange student to boost her own popularity.
'I think this is going to be a good semester.'