Everything Dearest

:: Chapter Three: Sketchpads ::

A face wide with a smile, Kaoru plopped down next to Misao on the grass and stretched. "Wow, I didn't remember school being so hard last year!"

Misao scowled. "Hard? This is beyond hard. What the heck is Saitou-sensei thinking, giving us a project already? And, I mean, it's a project to find your own live frog and dissect it. That's just not . . . right! And in all the four periods, we've all had projects and presentations and reports already!"

Megumi rolled her eyes and closed her powder compact. "Sophomore, you think this is hard? Just wait until you're an upperclassman. You'll die."

Tsubame practically squealed with fright. "Being a freshman's hard already . . ."

Kaoru leaned back against the tree. "Ah, no matter what, school's still fun! Especially since I have art, this year which is just empty credits."

"Ah," sighed Misao dreamily, "Aoshi-sama . . ."

Laughing, the four friends went back to talking and laughing.

.....

Kenshin sighed and dropped his body down behind a large, shady tree at the back of the school. Oh well, at least he had already gotten this far.

For every single class he'd had so far, he had aimed straight for the corner seat in the back. It wasn't that he wanted to slack this year -the projects the teachers assigned here were absolute pushovers- but he just couldn't stand all the peppy people in this school.

And peppy people simply filled Hiten High. Sitting in the back, he was separated by a few rows from the mob of navy and white cheerleading outfits. He vaguely remembered that girl from the last day –what was her name, Kara? Kago? Kora?- and she was the epitome of cheerleader-ness. Those annoying girls, whose lives have no meaning besides the popularity contests and material objects.

And the jocks! They were even worse than the others. He could tell that Koji and Keisuke had been accepted already. After all, those two fit right in: stupid, lumbering, and victimizes the others. They had already joined the mob of blue and white lettered jackets.

He pulled up the sleeve of his sweatshirt, revealing a large, violet bruise on his forearm. After his medieval Japanese class in third period, a group of those fools had gained up on him, pushing and beating him with fists. "Hey, queer guy," they'd sneered, "had fun with the hair dye lately? Why don't you join the cheerleaders? You'd fit in perfectly, homo!" They only stopped after they scampered away from the sight of a spiky-haired gangster. Seems like these people were all cowards.

But cowards were courageous when in groups, and it didn't help that a handful of them were in his first period kendo. He could just imagine tomorrow, when the kendo class would start to use bokkens. Kenshin put in a mental note to buy some more Advil.

He leaned back against the tree trunk and winced. More Advil, if only to relieve those newly formed slashes upon his back.

Kenshin sighed and pulled down his sleeve. A few bruises from imbecilic bullies were nothing.

....

"YOSH!" Kaoru yawned, as she walked into the large art room. "Easy period!"

"YOSH!" Misao squealed. "AOSHI-SAMA!"

The tall and silent man was still in his usual place as last year: a stool, propped at an angle against a blackboard. Impassively, he looked at his watch and then his roll sheet. When he heard Misao squeal his name, he didn't even bat an eye, and simply took another sip of his tea.

Misao dragged Kaoru to a table right in front of Aoshi's stool and started gazing, starry-eyed, at him. Kaoru rolled her eyes and looked around. Yep, these were the art geeks: that glasses-kid who'd been in her sixth grade class . . . that nerd in her Bio class . . . and wait!

Her eyes landed onto a small figure in the corner of the room, slouching in a black sweatshirt, a hood covering his head. She frowned: hoods weren't allowed indoors.

Apparently, Aoshi noticed him too. "You, in the corner," he said coldly, "that hood must come off."

Reluctantly, two hands came up and pulled the hood down. Ruby red bangs fell out, falling into deep, amethyst eyes. "Yes, sensei."

Kaoru grinned. This was that guy who just moved here! "Hey, Kenshin!" she yelled across the room, "what's up?"

But he didn't seem to hear her. Instead, his head was turned towards the window, one hand absentmindedly massaging his other arm.

Kaoru turned back to Misao. "What's up his back?"

Misao shrugged. "Seems like a weird kid to me."

A shrill bell rang, and Aoshi stood up. The class shushed under the presence of the tall man.

"I am Shinomori-sensei," he said tonelessly. "Many of you know me as a TA from last year. And I still am."

"And you always will be," Misao muttered dreamily.

"This year, though, Nakago-sensei, the usual art teacher, has decided to let me take over one class. So I will be the teacher of this joint advanced and beginning class."

He swiftly took out a stack of sketchpads from underneath his desk. "Your first assignment of this year is a sketch. Don't worry," he said, glancing at a group of panicky beginning art boys, "this is a partner assignment. Each beginning art student will be assigned to an advanced art student to sketch portraits of each other. Advanced art students will also be required to turn in at least ten sketched of their partner in normal, everyday positions. They'd also be required to turn the portrait into an oil painting."

He glanced again at the beginning art students. "You beginners have it lucky."

He took out two roll sheets from a pocket of his pants. "We have one more beginning art student, though . . . so one would be paired up with me. Would anyone like to volunteer themselves?"

Misao's hand shot up like a space rocket.

Aoshi looked at her. "You, girl, what's your . . ."

"Makimachi Misao!" she chirped.

". . . Makimachi, I will be your partner."

Kaoru had to kick her friend underneath the table to restrain the poor girl from screaming of joy.

"Anyways, I shall pair you off now." He took out a pen and started drawing lines. "Osaka Aiko . . . and Ogino Chihiro." Two girls from opposite sides of the room smiled at each other and moved side by side.

"Fujimoto Ai and Kaname Chiharu." A boy and a girl stood up, nodded at each other, and paired up.

Aoshi went on, pairing the people up. Finally, all the people were in duos except for two. "Lastly, Kamiya Kaoru and Himura Kenshin."

Kaoru glanced over her shoulder. Kenshin also blinked at her with large violet eyes. Smiling, Kaoru walked over to his seat, and he stood up.

"Hey. I believe we've met?"

Kenshin mutely nodded.

Grinning, Kaoru held out a hand. "Well, hello again, Himura!"

And she didn't know why, but Kaoru could swear that there was a flicker of fear in his eyes as he extended his hand to her.

:: End Chapter ::

What do you think? :] Yes, I finally found time to sit down and write. Congratulate me. xD I had such a great idea for this story, too, when I first started... then it got all out of hand. x.X What the hecksu.

Eh, names... lesse...
Aiko Osaka is my original character
Chihiro Ogino from Spirited Away
Fujimoto Ai from my weird memory of random words
Kaname Chiharu inspired by Power (or Girl Got Game, whatever you want to call it)
So no telling me I jocked anything. Because I credit em all here. Okays?

Thanks to everybody who reviewed!