Chapter 7: Toilet Water
The room was too cold. It was freezing, and I was hibernating under the covers. A few days ago I asked Kiku if something could be done but he replied sadly that we can't turn on the heater for its not cold enough for everyone to be in need for a heater. I don't know who can still be in their rooms without a heater now but fuck them.
Just to make everything better there was a knock on my door. Great, that means I need to get out of my warm bed and make way through my cold room to open the door to a cold hallway. Bloody brilliant.
I mumbled infanities to myself as I quickly jumped out from the covers and pulled on a sweater. Another knock was given to me, to probably tell me to hurry up. I tried combing my bed head down with my hands as I walked over to the door and twisted the door handle.
"Good morning Arthur-san," a soothing voice said. A bit of cold air nipped my skin as I pushed the door further open. Kiku was standing in a large sweatshirt as he held onto something wrapped in cloth and an envelope.
"Top of the morning to you to Kiku," I said before I yawned. Kiku fidgeted a bit, looking around at the wall.
"What is it that you want so early on a Sunday morning?" I questioned, rubbing my teary eyes a bit.
"Well, this is for you gym class," he said as he handed me the mystery item wrapped in cloth, "and this is, well, I think it'll be better for you to figure this out by yourself." And with that he handed over the envelope.
"Well, thank you Kiku! I have no idea what either of these are but I'll probably enjoy them," I replied. Kiku smiled a bit before he waved goodbye and left to return back to his dorm. I quickly shut the door and sat down onto my bed, wrapping my comforter around myself for the warmth I ended up losing from this across the room trip.
I decided to open the envelope first, which was a pleasant surprise. The envelope was filled with at least 20 pictures from the Halloween event, and how Kiku had gotten these pictures taken, we may never know. A small smile swelled onto my face as I looked through each of the pictures, most of them during the mayhem where Gilbert, Antonio, Francis and I chased each other around. There was actually one picture that I was surprised he got, of Natalia and I bickering behind the bush as we awaited for a new daretaker to walk the courage test path. I have no idea what happened to her or why she panicked at the end when she found out that the test was over. She just left without saying anything.
After looking through all of the pictures I placed them onto my desk and started to unwrap the clothed mystery.
Inside was a swimsuit.
Shit.
Shit.
Shit shit shit shit shit.
OOzOOOOOOOOzOO
Shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit.
I was standing in front of a completely filled pool.
Shit shit shit shit shit.
Paranoia surge through my body as I felt my eyes become mesmerized from the light to aqua blue of the water.
Shit shit shit shit.
Some kids around me jumped into the pool and started to swim around, with joy.
Shiiiiiiiiiiit.
ZOOOzOOOOzOOOZ
I have bloody concluded that I bloody hate pools because they bloody suck.
I was soaked in water as I huddled against myself. The room wasn't cold but it still was not pleasant in the least let me tell you. I buried my hands into my arms, my wet hair clinging onto skin it could get a hold of. I sat there silently, dreading for this class to be over as quickly as possible.
"Hey!" I jolted back a bit when I heard a voice call to me. My head swung up to see who was talking, which was a boy that had honey colored hair with a weird curly strand coming out.
"Do you mind if I sit with you?" The boy quietly questioned, fidgeting with his fingers a bit.
"Oh, um, yeah yeah, go ahead," I stuttered out, scooching a bit to the side for the boy to sit. I watched him as he lowered himself to the white tile floor. He quickly noticed me watching and gave a nervous smile before he raised a hand up to me.
"Hey, I'm Matthew," he said. I felt myself blink a couple of time before I took his hand and shook it a bit before saying, "I'm Arthur."
We released each others hand after our short introduction and was taken over by silence again. I felt a bit antsy with a quick urge to get rid of this awkwardness that seemed to like to consume me this past month, so I made the first step.
"Are you usually in this class?" I questioned, mentally facepalming myself in stupidity. Matthew looked a bit nervous as he kept staring at the pool filled with idiots before chuckling a bit.
"Yeah, I alway have, but I'm not surprised you didn't notice me. I don't really create much attention to myself so a lot of people miss me," he replied. I felt a bit sad knowing that I have spent the past three months in the same class with this kid and never once took much notice of him. So I decided to make a difference today.
The rest of the class was nowhere near as bad as I was expecting it to be like. Matthew and I spent the rest of the time talking about class and teachers as we ranted. Well, mostly me ranting, questioning why we had to have a swimming course in gym class, more or less why we have a swimming pool in this school to begin with.
I got to find out that Matthew was a student in all honors and was the top player in the school hockey team, which didn't seem to match Matthew at all. He also told me that his father was able to convince the school into allowing him in bringing a pet polar bear to the school, which was right now at the school animal center, along with Gilbert's bird that he busted out previously.
Class soon ended fortunately without me returning back into the treacherous wet depths of the water and a new friend for this horrible class, which seemed like a good start of a day.
And a good day it was.
Most people were still a bit tired from the party last week so the day ended eventless. The day was calm and relaxing, apart from the long classes that seemed to go on forever.
Well, it was peaceful until the very end of the day.
I decided to head over to the bathroom to wash my hands off after a sticky situation that happened in chemistry class. After thoroughly washing them with soap I quickly patted my wet hands onto my pants as I picked up my bag to leave until I bumped into something tough. Or someone to be more precise.
I rubbed my head a bit as I looked up to see who it was only to see a familiar face. My mind quickly started racing as scenario after scenario played through. Alfred looked a bit shock when I looked up, before his expression turned sour. I then opened my mouth to say, "Alfre-"
Before I could finish, some boys entered the bathroom. Without a second of thinking I grabbed a hold of the American's hand and dragged him into one of the stalls. He must have been shocked for he didn't protest a single word until I locked the door to the stall we were in.
"Wai-wa-let me go!" he whisper-yelled as he tugged his hand away from my grasp. I quickly raised a finger up to my mouth and "shh!" loudly for him to shut up.
"Wa-why did you-I need to get out of here," he whispered as he reached out for the lock. I slapped his hand without a second of waste.
"Don't you dare get out of here," I whisper-threatened. He ignored my threat and tried to unlock the door again, this time with both hands. I grabbed a hold the back and the collar of his football jacket, tugging for him to stay.
"Wha-! Let me go!"
"No, j-just listen!"
"Get off of me you crazy-"
Alfred was trying to hold me back with one hand and inch closer to the door of the stall with the other, as I continued to tug, and slap his arm with the other. His free arm then pinned me against the wall, causing me to release both of my hands from his body and grip onto his arm holding me. I then kicked up a foot and tried to lower his reaching hand from getting to the lock with it. There seemed to have been some water or toilet paper on the floor because Alfred took a step and quickly slipped, causing the two of us to tumble onto the floor with an 'umph'. My face crashed face first into his rock solid chest, pain searing through my nose as I pushed myself up with a groan. Alfred layed there for a moment, his glasses askew as he looked like he was thinking, thinking on how he even got into a situation like this.
He then quickly pushed himself up and tried to get up to the lock, until I grabbed both of his hands and hissed at him.
"Let me go Kirkland!" he whisper-shouted.
"Just hear me out first!" I whisper-replied. He started to flail his arms around, trying to release my grip. I then jumped onto his lap, to keep him on the ground as we kept wrestling with our arms.
"What the hell do you want!" he hissed out.
"I just want you to bloody-"
He flailed again.
"Just STOP! SHUT UP AND FUCKING LISTEN TO ME!" I yelled at him. He finally stopped, his brows furrowing, looking like a child pouting.
"Fine," he said, sounding exactly like a child. I then released the grip on his arms and lowered my hands, itching each other, nervously. My head unconsciously lowered and my gaze drifted to the side as Alfred pushed himself up, a hand pressing against his face. I gulped down extra saliva that was in my mouth along with my pride.
"Well?" He questioned in a bit of irritation. I flinched a bit and looked up at him, his eyes narrowing before softening a bit. I turned my gaze to the side again.
"Um I was wondering if you wouldn't mind to continue tutoring me." I mumbled out. He looked a bit confused before he said, "What?"
I bit my lip in a bit of annoyance as I kept my head turned to the side.
"I said," I looked back up to him, "if you could still tutor me!" I scrunched my eyes shut and watched my pride explode in my mind, scattering everywhere for me to go and find like an easter egg hunt.
I slowly opened one of my scrunched up eye to look at Alfred, who still looked confused. His mouth hung open in an 'o' shape before he said, "Um, yeah. Sure."
We stood there a bit silently for a few seconds, until Alfred coughed into his hand. He also turned his head a bit to the side as he said, "Do, do you think you could, like, get off?"
I quickly remembered that I was still sitting on him and jumped up, dusting my pants and coat. He too also got up, finally getting the chance to unlock the door of the stall he was trying so hard to do previously.
Fortunately there was no one in the bathroom for any misunderstandings to start, but I was positive that the boys that came in before heard pretty much everything. I felt the fine strands of my crazy hair as I combed through it with my hand, head still lowered in a bit of shame. Alfred quickly went to the exit and left, leaving me behind.
Until he opened the door again. "So, same time tomorrow?" He questioned, only his head sticking out.
"Uh, yeah. Tha-that will be great." I quickly replied, feeling myself standing a bit straighter.
"Okay, then so," he said as he tried to move his head while closing the door, only to shoot back and open the door a few times, until he finally said, "bye!" and closed the door, finally leaving me alone.
I sighed, happy being able to get that miserable experience over with. I reached down to pick up my bag I seemed to have dropped when I pulled Alfred into the stall and stood back up to see, my bright red face.
I sneered a bit at myself before I stomped off, crossing my fingers that my face would return to its normal light color before anyone sees me. When I left the school building, the cold attacked my face like a wave, cause it was so hot. Yet, I didn't feel as cold as I predicted.
I soon caught sight of two figures at the front gate of the school, Kiku and Yao, walking back to the dorm together.
I kept a distance from them, watching their backs, not wanting to ruin what may be one of their only chances on being with each other.
They both walked slowly and strangely quietly, Kiku looking straight ahead with his great posture and Yao, looking from the side of the road to Kiku in small glances. Yao furrowed his eyebrows a bit, debating, before he inched his hand toward Kiku's. But before he got the chance to hold his hand, Kiku quickly pulled away, carrying his bag with now both of his hands.
Yao's shoulders slumped a bit in what seemed like defeat as Kiku turned his head to the opposite side of Yao, brows furrowing into each other as his mouth was in a bit of a straight line, guilt written everywhere.
Yao then raised the hand he tried to hold Kiku's with up his head and started to talk and laugh, as if he what he was planning on doing was all just a show. Kiku looked up from the side and at Yao, his head nodding a bit before giving off what seemed like a sad smile. Yao smiled back. The atmosphere became thick with slow conversation as they made it to the dorm with me watching from behind, in secrecy.
It felt painful watching the two.
OOOOOOOOOOOO
The tall wooden doors of the library watched me as I looked, watched, stared at my clock.
3:59
click.
4:00
There's my cue. I pushed the left door and entered the library, swiftly making way to the table on the second floor where the last two tutor lessons were held, the corner of the table dented in. I plopped down into the seat, pulled out the math textbook, paper and pencil. I then waited for the American to come.
I still couldn't believe that I was able to convince him to continue giving me tutoring lessons. I was positive he was going to laugh and refuse me with a mocking smile. But instead he just agreed with a dumb expression on his face. I decided that this time I was going to show a bit more patience, to not have this lesson blow up like it did the last two times. Neither of the lessons were something I wished to repeat.
Five minutes passed and Alfred finally came, a bit of a mess, from untucked school dress shirt to carrying his jacket and backpack. He threw his backpack and jacket onto the table as he pulled out and sat in the chair across the table from me.
"I'm sorry I'm late," he said as he let his lungs fill back up with oxygen.
"No no, it's okay. I-I'm the one that asked you anyway," I said, my voice lowering as the sentence went on. I then pushed the textbook toward Alfred for him to look, and tell me what problem I should do.
"Uah, just do the first one," he said, barely giving the textbook a look. I pulled back the heavy book and wrote the first equation down, only to stare at it, searching through my mind on how I would even solve this problem. I gave Alfred a quick glance, who was putting on his jacket as I glance back down at my blank paper, scrunching my eyebrows together.
It wasn't long until I heard a voice.
"You need help?" Alfred asked, leaning back into his chair. No, of course I don't need help. Why would I ever need help from you? You're just a bloody American. I can do this all by myself without any help. I would rather kill myself than-
"Yeah…" I mumbled out, sighing a bit in defeat. He stood up and leaned forward, to look at the problem.
"So you have to get rid of the numbers first, and then divide the number multiplied by the exponent to both sides to get the exponent by itself," he quickly summarized, pointing to the numbers. He then pulled out a pencil and made arrows, on which number will be subtracted with, etc. He passed the paper back at me.
This time was a bit different than the last. The difference being I was able to solve it. I felt a bit giddy as I shifted a bit with happiness , finally conquering the math beast. With maybe a bit too much excitement I moved onto the next problem, only to be stuck again. It seems like there were going to be more bosses in this tough journey.
Alfred, taking the clue that I was stuck again got up and pointed out some pointer to what would make the problem easier to solve.
Question after question went by and finally I got to a point when I didn't need his help anymore. It seemed to have gotten easier and once I got it, it went by very quickly and smoothly, which was great. When I finally finished the last problem I pressed my cheek against the table, sighing this time with satisfaction. I looked at my watch to only see that it was 5:05.
"The rest you got correct so it seems that you understand this lesson now," a close voice said. No, wait, too close. I jerked up to see the American sitting in the seat next to me. When he got there, I have no clue.
"Okay," I said, lowering my head back down. The library unlike the dorm rooms had the heater on and was nice and warm. Maybe a bit too warm for even for me because I was placing my cheek onto the table to cool the heat. This time I sighed with a bit of pleasure.
"Hey, you do know that corrections are due tomorrow right?" Alfred asked. I froze for a sec before I raised my head.
"What corrections?" I asked nervously as with a strained smile. "The test corrections," he said, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.
Just remembering about the test made me want to jump into a pool. That's how much I truly detested it. Would I even be able to complete it? It had everything I didn't understand a week ago and I doubt that I would understand that even now.
As if answering my prayers, Alfred asked, "Do you want help on that?"
I opened my mouth to say yes, until a thought hit me. What if he laughs. What if he makes fun of me about it. He probably would keep making jokes on how I could get problems that are simple to him wrong. He'll probably stuff it in my face and just laugh laugh laugh.
I looked over to him to refuse. 'Too late,' my mind whispered as I saw Alfred take out the test that was peeking out from my open folder. My body felt like lead as he looked over the test, top to bottom, front to back. He then opened his mouth.
"Most of the problems you did correctly but added instead of subtracted along with forgetting to switch the greater than or less than signs around. Other than that you should be able to finish it fine."
What? He didn't-what? Francis would have already insulted me by then and Gilbert probably would have laughed his head off. Even he could apparently do simple problems like this.
"He-y, Artie? You there?" He asked, waving the test in my face. I blinked out and pulled the test out of his hands before giving him a scowl.
"It's Arthur and you should ask for permission before you do something like that Jones, it is very rude," I replied in a snapping tone. He looked startled for a moment before he smile and pushed himself up.
"Well I'll be going now so I'll see you Thursday?" He said as he threw his backpack over his shoulder.
"Yes," I replied, shoving my test back into my folder.
"Okay, bye then," He said, walking toward the maze of bookshelves to get out of the library. I spun around in my seat as I opened my mouth to say something. Nothing came out.
Alfred left without turning back, leaving me alone once again, this time with words lodged in my throat, trying to escape with all the strength they had. Yet strings of pride restricted it back, not allowing them to pass.
I slumped down into my chair and sighed for what felt like the hundredth time, with defeat once again. I quickly packed up my papers and textbook into my bag before I also made my way out of the maze, the words that were caught in my throat drifting inside my brain.
Thank you
A/N:Renka
Arthur changed a lot in a couple of chapters *sigh* Remember he was just fighting with Alfred two chapters ago, also only a week ago in this world. Which come my main concern. DID I MELLOW ARTHUR TOO MUCH? DID I MAKE ALFRED A BIT TOO FORGIVING? PLEASE SOMEONE FICKIN TELL ME IF IT'S GOOD OR NOT CAUSE DAPANDA JUST SENDS ME PICTURES WHEN I ASK HER. I'M FREAKING OUT SO HARD RIGHT NOW, JUST PLEASE! SHE WON'T FRICKIN ANSWER ME AND IT'S KILLING ME! AAAAAAAAAAHH!
Also if you guys think he's always going to be like this you're wrong! He just mellowed down this part cause he really wants to get tutoring. He will get tsuntsun later on with Alfred.
Kiku and Yao are getting tense like big time. I have no idea if we will be having any more HeraclesxKikuxYao action anytime soon though… *kicks dirt and grass*
Next chapter we will have a new character introduced! Wohoo! And this character has already been mentioned in this story (like a tiny bit but still mentioned). Can anyone guess who? I doubt it though. He has a very tragic backstory that I am hoping will become canon sometime in the future. It's so obvious that it kills me and my fellow hetalian.
Arthur's pride is getting in the way for a lot of stuff. He's gonna have to learn to suppresses it soon. Like honestly, it's so painful yet fun for me when writing. Cause in the weirdest way I'm very much like Arthur, just a few changes there, but when writing about the parts of his character that isn't like me it's super tough…..
I think that's all I'm going to have to say for this chapter so fun fact time! Don't forget to review!
Fun Fact: In Nara prefecture, Japan, deers and people lived in harmony for 1300 years. You can see deers all over the city. They are called 'bowing deers' because they bow to people to get food.
Dapanda:
Fun Fact: In any part of america, deers and people have a different type of relationship for as long as american had cars and guns. You can see dead deer on the side of the highway all the time. They are called 'road kill' because they are usually on the side of the road half alive, living out the rest of their time on earth in lots of pain or with some dead bodies that could have been tossed along that same road, highway or street.
God Bless America
Renka: Oh you little fucker. We also got a friend to become our beta after failing to hide the fact we were writing a fanfiction (nira *dapanda*) but I guess it was a happy accident! So she's our new beta-chan!
