NOTE: Just a few warnings: shoujo is strong with this one; Midou being nasty to customers (and everyone else); drama intensifies and Onoda gets a bit damsel-in-distress-y

„I'm Onoda Sakamichi! Just Sakamichi is fine! Let's work hard and get along, ok?"

Sakamichi remembered her words of kindness to the newcomer. That was a few hours ago. And there she was, explaining for the third time where he could find stuff to clean the toilets with. That was their job as well, cleaning the whole restaurant after closing hours.

„See? There are cleaning products and here you can find a mop and a bucket to..."

„Gross..."

„Well, the bucket is old and in use all the time, so it's obvious it looks like that..."

„Yeah, I can tell. That's not what I meant though," he looked at her.

„It isn't? Oh. Ok," she nodded nervously. „S-Shall I explain how to collect dirty trays from the lobby?"

„Do I look like I need to receive an explanation how to go to the disgusting lobby, pick up the gross trays and carry them back?" he stared at her with the eyes of a murderer. Or at least that's how it felt like to Sakamichi. Well, now that he mentioned it, he did look like he could use an explanation for that... or how to act normal in general. He truly had an auro of a proper weirdo. Sakamichi got immediately angry at herself for thinking such a nasty thing about her new colleague.

„No, I just wanted to make sure. I'd hate to forget anything important. But you know...," Sakamichi took a deep breath and started to explain how yesterday was supposed to be his first shift during which he had to remember as much as he could and she was there to help him, however starting today he was supposed to work on his own just like everyone else or they'd be short on staff this afternoon.

„But well, Makishima-san said you'd be cleaning the lobby today. That's really easy, but I still wanted to explain to you everything I could!"

As Midousuji was about to say some clever retort originating in the not-really-nice parts of his vocabulary, a red spiky head appeared in the doorway of the small closet for storing cleaning utensils.

„Onoda-chan, have you... oh, there you are, Dumbsuji!" Naruko growled at Sakamichi's companion.

„Oh come on, Naruko-kun," the girl frowned a little as if she was scolding her younger sibling.

Oh, she knew now, the reason why Imaizumi left so quickly without as much as saying hi to her. She'd thought before the name of Midousuji Akira rang a bell and there was a good reason for it. Midousuji was a captain of a rival bicycle racing team from Kyoto, and yep, both Imaizumi and Naruko hated the guy. She also found out that she was the only person to learn his name before his first day at work and yesterday both Naruko and Imaizumi had a day off, so there was nobody to riot against the new co-worker Midousuji Akira.

„I can't help it! Dammit, what was Makishima-san thinking, hiring a guy like that?! What are you doing over here anyway?! Did they ban your skinny ass in Kansai?! Because I can totally see that happening!" Naruko roared like one of the tigers he always wore printed on his t-shirts.

„My presence here has nothing to do with you, Naruko. But I suppose you'd know a lot about getting kicked out of Kansai, right?" Midousuji snapped back while literally snapping his back, as it made a terrible sound that made Onoda slightly sick. As if his bones and tendons broke and rattled.

„P-Please, don't fight, you two!" Onoda croaked with trembling voice. „Naruko-kun, why were you looking for Midousuji-kun?" she asked the redhead, knowing he'd calm down if he was forced to concentrate on her instead of the newbie.

„It's time for him to go and clean the freaking lobby," Naruko replied, indeed in a bit more mellow voice. A bit. Sakamichi looked at Midousuji with slight desperation in her eyes.

„Can I go too, to give him a hand for a short while?" she wondered.

„I doubt it, the Hotshot left due to severe disgust and there aren't enough people in the kitchen. Can't really blame him though," he glared at Midousuji who immediately glared back.

„I see," Onoda sighed. „Ok, I'll be going to the kitchen then, Midousuji-kun! Go and do your best!" she left with Naruko, who was supposed to be at the checkout today. Actually, he was there nearly every day, because was capable of selling a half of the menu to a customer who came in to buy a single hamburger. Onoda admired him for that skill.

As usual, things got really busy in the early afternoon, and soon enough Sakamichi was totally overwhelmed making potato fries in alarming speed. To give herself strength to keep up with hungry high schoolers who often flooded the restaurant in large numbers, she always hummed her favourite anime song. After all, Imaizumi mentioned before how rhythm was important for climbing hills and Sakamichi was pretty sure it was the same with preparing a lot of fries in a small period of time.

Due to all the noises the kitchen usually made during the busiest opening hours, she could hardly hear what was happening around the check outs, let alone in the lobby. She imagined Midousuji walking around with the dirty trays, looking extremely bizarre with the uniform on. It made her really anxious for some reason.

„Onoda, it's about time you took a break," one of her female co-workers informed her. It surprised her so much she almost burned her hand with hot frying oil. Oh yes, her break, she almost forgot about that. Normally she'd sit back in the locker room with her lunchbox and read manga she'd brought with herself, but today she felt too stressed to do something like that. Instead, she considered the option to check on Midousuji and his battle with dirty trays.

„Well, first things first," she thought for herself and headed for the toilets, but couldn't make it, because unfortunately for her poor bladder she overheard a conversation from Makishima's office. It seemed Naruko was letting their boss know what he thought about the whole Midousuji business.

„You can't be serious, Makishima-san! So what if we have little staff? I would rather do it all by myself than have that freak around! Why did you have to employ him, you know how Hotshot feels about him!" the redhead sputtered. Sakamichi had hard time figuring out what he was saying as he was spitting the words out so quickly.

„I'm not discussing it with you, Naruko. As I said, we don't have enough people, end of story. If he does a poor job, I can always fire him," Makishima shrugged, peeked at his phone that just started to ring and cut the call straight away without bothering to pick it up.

„I can't take it! Watching him creeping around the lobby is so frustrating! A little while ago he made a little girl cry! By just looking at her! I'm telling you, Makishima-san, he's going to scare away all the customers!" Naruko looked like he was about to riot. Sakamichi wondered if she should jump in the conversation and calm Naruko down, but there was no need to in the end. Naruko's break was over and he had to get back to work. However, she felt the need to apologise for her hot-headed friend.

„Makishima-san, um...," she knocked on the opened door slowly.

„Ah, Onoda. You've overheard us, haven't you," he sighed and invited her in with a wave of his palm.

„Yeah, sort of... I'm really sorry for Naruko acting like that," she apologised for the young hot-tempered boy.

„I can't really blame him. To be honest, I expected this kind of thing happening, Naruko protesting and Imaizumi running off home. That's why I kept the newcomer's name secret as long as I could," he replied. „I realise he might be bad for the business just like Naruko said. Having him around might be problematic for the atmosphere in workplace itself, but I've decided to give him a chance. Onoda, I have a favour to ask," he continued.

„Eh? A favour? What kind of favour?" Sakamichi blinked. It somehow felt as if he was about to bestow a holy mission upon her. At moments like that she felt like the Love Hime herself.

„I know it will be hard on you, but do you think you could make sure Naruko and Imaizumi don't fight with Midousuji? It feels like they will listen to you," he asked. Sakamichi stared at him and pointed at her nose.

„You mean... me?" she gasped. Makishima just nodded. „S-Sure, if that's what you want me to do. I will do my best!" Sakamichi agreed, wondering if she could pull it off. Naruko felt like a storm when he got angry and both Imaizumi and Midousuji were so tall... She wanted to ask Makishima more about the reason why he hired Midousuji, but at that point his phone began ringing again. The green haired man cursed, apologised to her and picked it up. Not wishing to eavesdrop on his private phone calls, she quickly left his office.

Sakamichi spent the rest of her break secretly watching Midousuji cleaning the lobby. He gave of a feeling of a stressed animal trapped in a cage. It would seem he walked around without any sort of purpose or order. Whenever he leaned down to clean an oily table after customers left, he trembled a bit, possibly with anger, and started muttering something for himself.

At one point customers eating at a table next to the one he was cleaning stared at him as if he was a mythical creature, took their unfinished food and left, obviously changing their plans of eating in the lobby to eating anywhere else but the terrible creature's lair. Sakamichi couldn't hear him say it, it could be that he merely moved his lips in silence, but she knew what he spelled as he started cleaning their table as well. So GROSS. It seemed he found a used bubble-gum on the tray. She had to agree, it was really gross. Some people simply had no manners.

Sakamichi was about to return to the kitchen, when she noticed a young father and a small boy passing Midousuji on their way to the counter. The boy suddenly tripped and fell to the floor. She had a bad feeling it was her colleague's doing, but decided to be optimistic and don't suspect him. He even helped the kid get up from the floor! It seemed like a really nice gesture.

„Oh oh, careful young man, we don't want you to get some gross injury," he said in rather fake, sweet voice. Sakamichi watched him, as he caressed the boy's hair, more like rubbed them really, as the boy's father apologised to Midousuji and thanked him for his help. Both the boy and the father then left to order their food.

It wasn't till later when Sakamichi stood in at checkouts for a co-worker that needed to go to the restroom that she realised what her new colleague had done. The reality hit her hard as she watched the young boy from before trying to get a bubble gum from his hair with the help of his father, who seemed really pissed off at the poor child.

„O-Oh... He didn't... Or did he really...?" she stared at the fighting boy, completely ignoring the customer in front of her. Naruko had to poke her with his elbow to return her to her senses. Onoda noticed Naruko was acting normal. Thank god, he hadn't noticed the incident! She was sure he'd caused uproar if he'd noticed. This way she could talk to Midousuji about it without unnecessary aggression.

She got a chance to talk to do so at the end of their shift. He nearly bumped into her as she was leaving girls' locker room.

„Be careful, would you, Sakamichiii," he scolded her, his voice full of poison.

„W-Wait, Midousuji-kun! I want to ask you something!" Onoda burst out without hesitation. If she gave it a second thought, she would never gather enough courage to ask him about the bubble-gum incident.

„What is it, Sakamichiii?" he came closer to her. Sakamichi felt goose bumps popping out on her arms.

„The... The boy that tripped over... You made it look like you caressed his hair, but you were rubbing the bubble gum in it, weren't you?" she stared at him, trying to look intimidating but an „angry puppy" look was all she could pull off.

„Oooh, so you were spying on me? What a gross girl you are, Sakamichiii, spying on your co-workers. Very very gross," he taunted her.

„I wasn't spying! I just happened to see you when you did it," she pouted, realising how much of a coincidence that would have to be.

„Let me compliment your observation skills then. It doesn't change the fact that you're a gross woman though," he hissed, leaning down to her. Sakamichi gulped. He looked really menacing.

„You're lucky Naruko didn't see you! Why did you do that? The kid did nothing wrong!" She wasn't sure if it was a good idea, scolding him like a little rascal.

„He was a small fry. Just like his father. Just like you are. He deserved it," Midousuji frowned.

„What for? It wasn't him who left the bubble gum on the tray! The other customers did."

„Well, he would leave it there as well, if he had any. That will teach him not to act gross in public," he replied. Sakamichi's eyebrows twitched at the weird logic he came up with.

„Anyway, I'm not telling anyone about it, ok? But please don't do that again, it's a nasty thing to do!" she told him with absolute resolution in her face. Midousuji glared at her, his expression absolutely blank on the other hand. Quick, she had to say something nice next. „H-How was your first day? You did a good job! Did you enjoy yourself?" Oh no, what was she trying to achieve? To sound like a good supportive colleague? As if something like that could work with him.

„Huh? Enjoy myself? GROSS! How could I enjoy myself doing such a gross job! What a gross question, Sakaaamichiii! You're not only gross, you're also very stupid, you gross woman!" he fussed. Sakamichi tightened her grip on her bag.

„The job isn't that gross ," she murmured.

„That's because you yourself are gross. I'm outta here. I don't think I'll come tomorrow. Farewell, Sakamichi," he said and disappeared. Sakamichi let out a deep sigh, either of relief or frustration, she had no idea which one it was.

Her plans for the evening were simple: eating mom's homemade food, clean a little and then watch anime episodes she missed due to her job; she organised her free time while riding her granny bike home through fields. There wasn't much traffic right now, so she felt quite safe even with her earphones on. There was only one song she could listen to right now. Her potato-fry-making theme of course. She hummed happily, her eyes fixed on the end of the road ahead.

„Hime hime..."

„Going home, Onoda?" she suddenly heard male voice on her left side.

„HIMEEEE!" Her singing changed to a loud shriek of panic as she lost control of her bike. Oh no, she was about to fall into the trench by the road.

„Careful!" the person who startled her grabbed the handlebars of her bike, keeping it steady and saving her from harm in the process. Sakamichi looked at her saviour and immediately blushed.

„Imaizumi-kun!" she yelled, taking off her earphones. „I couldn't hear you coming at all!"

„Obviously you couldn't with the earphones. It's dangerous, Onoda."

„Sorry about that," she apologised with a shy smile, then she remembered what had happened that morning. „O-Oh, are you alright? You left in hurry... You didn't even say hi."

„Yeah, my bad. I just couldn't handle the Grossuji appearing in our job. What was Makishima-san thinking, hiring a guy like him?" he wondered.

„Naruko-kun was saying the same thing. But please, try not to pick up fights with Midousuji-kun, ok? It wouldn't be good for the business," she stressed out her wish.

„I know but it's kinda hard when just seeing that guy's face makes me want to punch him so badly," Imaizumi sighed.

„I... I see. But I'm sure Midousuji-kun can't be that bad. I will make sure he behaves himself," Sakamichi said with pure resolve.

„I'd prefer if you didn't get too close to him. The guy may not seem like that, but he's totally dangerous," Imaizumi worried. The girl's cheeks reddened. Actually, Midousuji looked really dangerous to begin with. She wasn't stupid enough to ignore that, but there were things she had to do. Makishima-san asked her to do it and doing it was exactly what she planned to do.

„What's with that determined face? You look like Kotori when she decided she had to defeat the evil guys in episode forty seven," Imaizumi commented casually.

„Haha, Imaizumi-kun!" she started laughing. Imaizumi quickly grabbed her handlebars again, because her riding got wobbly once more. It was her who made him watch Love Hime, in spite of himself. Onoda knew how rare it was when he made Love Hime references, but she absolutely loved when it happened. Especially when he compared her to the heroine, Kotori.

„I'm glad you're ok though," she said when she calmed down a little. „You looked really angry when you left."

„Ok? I'm not ok at all! I had to take a hundred and seventy kilometre long ride to calm down after seeing that freak this morning. I will leave you now. See you tomorrow," he left her side and sped up. Sakamichi didn't say anything besides a seemingly happy „see you".

Well, Midousuji did mention he might not be coming back tomorrow, but she would hate to give her friend false hopes that would stay unfulfilled. Maybe they would all laugh about their one-day-weirdo-colleague the next day.

But he showed up the next day, much to Onoda's surprise and Naruko and Imaizumi's dismay. Once again he was in charge of cleaning the lobby, once again he drove Naruko mad with his unusual movement patterns and rude treating of their customers. Sakamichi tried to talk to them both, calming Naruko down and trying to talk some sense of good customer service into Midousuji, but it felt like her interventions were merely slowing down the inevitable clash of the two individuals. At least Imaizumi was trying to avoid Midousuji and if possible, ignore Midousuji's taunting he was getting in large servings.

Onoda took her job of a peace-keeper within the restaurant very seriously, but it started to take its toll on her. She often wondered why she even bothers being nice to Midousuji, when he seemed so set on acting as nasty as he could to her. No, she didn't believe he was really like that. Thinking he's just putting an act was a crucial thing in this whole peace-keeping mess, but as days went by, turned into weeks and Midousuji was still acting really nasty to everyone, her determination started to fade and she would totally give up long ago if it wasn't for her promise to their boss Makishima, who seemed to have some problem on his own with the person that kept calling him all the time.

Sakamichi went as far as making sure she dropped by the restaurant even on her days off, if Naruko and Midousuji were both at work on that day. She always made a silly excuse, pretending to be out shopping for new manga to read, but no one really bought that and Imaizumi commented how the restaurant isn't paying them well enough for her excuse of constant manga shopping to actually work.

It was the same case that evening. Both Naruko and Midousuji had an afternoon shift, when she entered in the restaurant, prepared to say she was out with her mom and decided to drop by to say hello. She froze as soon as she opened the door though.

For the first time ever she could see Midousuji on a checkout right next to Naruko, who looked like he was about to go ballistic. She could only imagine Midousuji trying to sell things for others, no, she didn't even wish to imagine something like that. After all, there was a good reason why they never let him sell food. His treatment of customers during his cleaning shifts was speaking for itself. As she could see them there, side by side, she faced a terrible dilemma. Whom she would order food from?

No matter what option she'd go with, it was a no win situation. If she ordered from Midousuji, he would laugh at Naruko, humiliating him with nasty words. If she ordered from Naruko, Midousuji would do the same thing to her! She ended up ignoring them and sitting at a table furthest from the counter. She pulled out a volume of some manga from her bag and pretended reading while observing the situation not-so-sneakily. The restaurant was nearly empty so it was a matter of time till one of them asked her to order.

It didn't come to that, though. The entrance door opened again and a group of young boys entered the restaurant. It was hard to tell exactly how old they where, could be anything from fourteen to eighteen, but it was unlikely they were older than Onoda. They assembled at the counter, ordering food from Midousuji, because Naruko left for the restroom a few moments before. When they got their stuff, they stood in the lobby for a while, wondering where they should sit. At that point, Onoda was trying her hardest to discover her hidden powers to turn invisible, because that's what she could use at the situation she found herself in.

The group of loud boys noticed her, walked towards her table and gathering around her, they trapped her in a corner.

„Hey, aren't you a bit lonely, sitting here in a corner?" one of the guys asked her. He leaned dangerously close. His clothes reeked of cigarettes.

„N-Not really," she shook her head, trying to hide her manga into her bag.

„Huh, what are you reading? Isn't it manga? Hey, are you one of those rotten nerdy girls?" another of the boys asked.

„N-No, I'm not," she shook her head once more. Well, she was a bit nerdy, but she wouldn't call herself rotten, certainly not.

„And why is it you don't have anything to eat? Don't you have money? Or maybe you're a creepy stalker that is here to spy on that lovely tall guy behind the counter? Girl, you have some weird sense of aesthetics, you know that?"

„It's not like that!" Sakamichi panicked. Oh god, why would she even come there today! What a stupid idea that was! „P-Please give my manga back!" she whined as one of the boys took her comic book and accidentally spilled ketchup over it.

„Say, are you a virgin?" the smelly boy asked her, pressing himself against her tiny frame.

„W-What?" Sakamichi's head was about to explode, what kind of question that was?

„Oh come on, don't be shy. You know what I.. ugh!" he gasped in the middle of a sentence as someone grabbed his shirt and jerked him away from Onoda as if he was a children's toy.

It took the girl a while to realise what was happening around her. She saw Midousuji standing at the end of the table, his height being taller than any of the boys, and to her surprise he was holding the smelly guy's face in one of his bony hands while taking potato fries with the other and, oh no, sticking them into the guy's face.

„You gross small fry... Why don't you shut your face and eat your disgusting potato fries, hmm?" Midousuji glared at the youngster while continuing to fill his face with the salty potato sticks.

„Oh fuck, it's a psycho!" the other boys yelled in horror and left the fast food as if their lives depended on it. Such good friends they were, Sakamichi wondered in a fraction of a second, but she was the one to talk! She'd run herself if she could actually move. Seeing Midousuji force feeding the guy while he was squealling like a piglet really scared her. She should probably do something!

„Mi... Midousuji-kun, you shouldn't...," she opened her mouth slowly, but her intervention was not needed at all. Naruko stormed into the lobby, grabbed Midousuji's uniform and tore him away from the kid. The boy fell to the floor, spitted out all the fries he couldn't swallow and ran away in tears.

„What the fuck, Stupidsuji!" Naruko screamed. „What the actual fuck?! Is this how you treat customers?! Are you out of your mind?! They could call the police! You fucking asshole!" He pushed Midousuji against the table and started throwing punches at him. The taller boy got startled by the surprise attack, but recovered quickly and punched the redhead back. Before Sakamichi knew, they were punching each other as if they were characters in some fighting game.

„G-Guys! Stop it! Please!" Sakamichi jumped on her feet and tried to pull them apart. Luckily for the petite girl, neither of them was so enraged that they had no idea what was going on. They figured Sakamichi got between them and for this one time, it actually worked. She stopped them from fighting, even though it was a real gamble.

„You're fucked! I'm so telling Makishima-san, you fucking newt!" Naruko hissed at Midousuji, as he was picking himself up from the floor.

„Whatever, grosshead," Midousuji spitted back and with a glance in Onoda's direction, he turned away and left the lobby in haste.

„W-Wait, Midousuji-kun!" Onoda called after him. Was he planning to run away from his job or what?

„Leave him be, Onoda-chan," Naruko growled. „We're better off without him anyway." He wiped his face with a sleeve of his uniform. He had a nosebleed. „What a shithead, terrorizing a customer like that..."

Onoda bit her lower lip.

„It wasn't quite like that, Naruko-kun... Midousuji-kun... He actually..."

Thoughts were spinning in her head, making her slightly dizzy. Was it just her imagination or did Midousuji actually protect her just now?