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[UPBEAT DENIAL]

Chapter Two: Horrendously Hilarious

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"Takeru...What. The. Fuck?"

"Good afternoon," I greet her.

"Not good. Not good at all!" Catherine breathily replies, switching back to native French. "It's not the afternoon here, you little bitch!"

"Come on," I placate. "I know you miss me."

I hear a masculine groan, and some shuffling coming from her end of the line. I can vividly picture her now, easily fixing her composure, slipping out of bed and creeping out of the bedroom. By now, I know all her mannerisms since she had been my former apartment buddy.

"Have you ever heard of time differences?"

"Can't say I have," I say.

It's approximately nine in the morning in Paris, but for my dear cousin this is an obnoxious time for her to be awake. She's the type to usually sleep until noon. Even from Japan, the creaking floorboards are audible. She's going to the kitchen - probably to make her usual morning coffee.

"Sure, sure. Now stop grinning," she hisses.

"How do you know I am?"

"I know you are. I can hear it in your voice, you idiot."

My lips stretch wider from her calling me out. Like how I can predict her mannerisms, she always can predict mine. Talking to her is making my walk feel quicker, not that I need my stroll to go any faster.

The school is about five minutes from the Odaiba-Kaikinkoen station. Prior to scooting off to France, I had walked this route several times. So many times that I've memorised the commute as a twenty-nine year old.

I've got a couple more minutes to spare, so I keep talking shit.

"So...was the guy any decent?"

"What guy?"

I snort. "You know, the guy in your bed?"

"Takeru!"

There's no way she can get it past me. Every Thursday she brings a guy home. Catherine's gorgeous and, arguably, one of the top models in the industry. She does whatever (and whoever) she wants - and I've never been one to stop her. We're kinda the same type in that sense. It's a mutual respect...but that doesn't stop us from teasing each other about it.

"He has to be at least an eight because you're a ten," I tell her. "Don't lower your standards, Catherine. Unfortunately, you're related to me, which is why I can't have you frolicking around and ruining the family name by getting with somebody beneath you."

She laughs at this. "God, I miss you and your dramatics."

"My life is a drama."

"Hmm...yeah, I can see that." She pauses. "Talking about theatrics - Brielle? Have you spoken to-"

"No." I talk over her, stopping her from finishing the sentence. I know what she's going to say and there's no point entertaining something that I'm not in the mood to think about.

"I guess you're still prickly about it."

"Maybe," I murmur, "But you know I tried, Cat."

She sighs. "I know you did. I'm not saying you didn't. It's just…"

"Let's leave it," I say, eyes glimpsing ahead of me as the school comes into focus. As I keep walking forward, the lines of the building become more refined. "I'm almost here anyway."

"Where?"

"Almost at my old school - the one Kana goes to," I fill her in. And, just for good measures, I include, "Because she apparently has gotten into a fight."

"You're joking! She's only been there for two months!"

My cousin's voice is filled with both admiration and pride. She's replicating the same emotions I'm feeling right now. Perhaps this is why Cat and I can never settle. Instead of being upset that Kana has gotten into a fight, we're finding this situation amusing.

"Right?" I chuckle. "She's living up to the Takaishi name."

"She sure is," Catherine comments back.

I mention, "Which is why I could do with some of your inspiration."

"My inspiration?" She says, "In what way, Takeru? I don't see how I can be of any help. How does this relate to Kana-chan?"

I explain, "Absorbing your bitchy vibes will assist me resonating it, when I storm into the office and argue with the teacher. You're my power source, my pep-talk before I delve into a raging battle."

"Gee...uh-thanks?" She's tossing between feeling insulted or complimented by my remark.

"You're welcome."

"I swear, you can be such a diva."

"And I miss you too," I add.

"Liar."

"No. Seriously." I frown, thinking about what future holds me once I step past the school gates. "Cat, get me out of here. Why don't we swap places? I hate speaking in formal Japanese. It does nothing for me but kill my soul."

"I don't speak Japanese so I can't help you there. Besides, you're the one who chose to go back. You could have stayed." Catherine catches on. "But you're calling me because you're nervous, right?"

Yups. She knows me a bit too well.

"Yeah," I admit. "I don't remember the last time I've spoken Japanese formally. Speaking in my mum's office doesn't count...going to a school battleground is different. I have to use the passive-aggressive approach if I have to reprimand someone."

"So you're planning to reprimand the teacher?" Catherine questions me, discovering my ultimate plan of attack.

"It's definitely not Kana's fault," I say with utmost confidence.

"Well, good luck with it then. The eight is coming down the stairs so I gotta go." Catherine laughs at my dejected gasp. "Tell me how it goes. I want the deets."

"But Cat-!"

She's hung up. The traitor.

Although Catherine's abandoned me, my chest feels less tight.

The nerves aren't completely gone, but I do feel better than I originally had. It's weird because I rarely get like this. I haven't yet readjusted to the rigid habits and the monotone, restrictive ways of this culture. A couple of weeks back in Tokyo is not going to make up for my fourteen years of lost time. I still blunder and stammer whenever somebody bows at me. It's like I'm royalty (my mum rolled her eyes at me when I commented about this to her).

True to my royalness, a couple of school girls giggle when they see me. I catch their slight chatter with the wind. Gaikokujin, kakkoi desu yo ne~. Ah yes, I haven't heard that term for a while. They think I don't understand them.

A little teasing won't kill anybody.

I smile and give them a slight bow, thanking them with an, "Arigatou gozaimasu."

The look on their faces is priceless. One girl is covering her mouth and the other girl's face transitions to a nice shade to a nice, tomato red. I toss them a wink, passing by them and crossing the street towards the school.

My mother and Kana hate it whenever I act outrageous and go 'overboard'. They often accuse me of flirting. In this situation, there's no harm embracing who and what I am.

The younger me would have taken it seriously or ignored the gaikokujin comment altogether. It's a common term I've grown accustomed to. It's not a big insult, however it does get frustrating when you've lived in Japan for an adequate amount of time, but people keep addressing you as a 'foreigner'. Despite being fluent in the language, the culture, or living here since you were born - it doesn't matter.

When you don't look Japanese or have a hint of 'white' blood in you, you're labelled as a foreigner and the locals have this habit of pointing you out and gawking when they stumble across you. It's like you're an animal living in a zoo, being constantly examined by an audience you could do without.

Yes, I know I have blond hair. Yes, I know I also have blue eyes. That doesn't mean I'm entitled to not praise the Japanese side of my genetics. I still like a cheeky bowl of soba noodles in between meals. I like wearing yukatas in the summer and I am obsessed with the onsen culture. As a youth, I loved frequenting traditional kabuki theatres (instead of spending my pocket money on Akihabara arcades). If anything, I'm more of an ojiisan than a gaikokujin from this fact alone.

Me being at my old school makes me feel even more ancient and ojiisan-ish. As I drift past the first two buildings, I stride into Building C. I refer back to my latest text, using it to determine my destination.

Building C - East Wing - Room 5.

I'm sure this building was what I used in eighth grade. No wonder these hallways feel vaguely familiar. The school must have renamed the buildings though. The 'East Wing' does not sound familiar at all.

School's ended for the day, but there are students lingering still. After school sports and extracurricular activities. I'd forgotten how much of a big deal Japan made out of the clubs, but it wasn't like I could compare it to the France schooling system either.

Upon finding room 5, I slide the door open.

Kana is the closest to the door.

She frowns at my appearance and murmurs to me, "Où est ma mère?"

"Why? Embarrassed to have me here, Kana-chan?"

She rolls her eyes, ignoring me. Her jaw hardens, folding her arms as she tries to disguise the fury in her eyes. Whenever she's unimpressed or mad, these haughty mannerisms are how she displays her silent tantrums. Actions speak much louder than words in her case. She's been like this ever since she was little.

Kana can carry a sulk as long as she chooses to. When she gets like this, she reminds me of Yamato. It doesn't help that she possesses the same sandy blond hair as he does - although longer, reaching her shoulders. And, of course, her eyes are a prettier and lighter shade of blue than mine and my older brother's.

There is another kid a few seats besides her. A male student. He makes a show not to look at me, staring out the window. Although he is not looking in my direction, I can see that his nose is mildly swollen and there's a hint of a nasty bruise hovering around his eye.

I gaze back at Kana, scanning her over. She's fine. Thank God. I'm relieved that it's the other kid who got beat up and not her. This means she must have won the fight.

Which means - she had knocked the shit out of him!

I bite my bottom lip, holding back a chuckle. This is why I will never get role model of the year.

"Mr Takaishi."

Ah, so this must be the teacher. I guess I'll soon know exactly what happened...

The text from mum had been brief, and lacking sufficient detail for me to surmise what exact crime Kana had isn't one to cause a commotion, therefore finding out the source to why she acted the way she did. Though, I must say, it had amplified my curiosity and had given me a great excuse to leave work early.

"Mr Takaishi?"

I recognise the voice before I gaze up at her - and boy is it tripping me out.

In the past twenty-four hours, this is the second time Hikari Yagami has graced me with her presence. From years of not a trace of communication, we're interacting again in the span of less than one day.

Her eyebrows furrow when she studies me, combining bewilderment and apprehensiveness into a new genre. Her calling me Takaishi instead is strange because she's never addressed me by this surname.

"Yagami...sensei?" I respond back, uncertainly. Who would have thought?

Hikari's attire is similar to last night. This time round she has this long grey skirt, and her heels are higher. But it's the black blouse that makes you take a second look. There's a slight plunge, a few inches shy from showing some cleavage - not that she has much of it anyway.

I force myself to look away from there and, yes, back to her brown eyes. Unfortunately, they're leering at me in return. I give her a tiny smile for catching me, and she stifles a frustrated sigh in reply.

"Please take a seat. I am Kana's homeroom teacher."

Hikari plasters a professional, straight face as she introduces herself to me. I know she's keeping up appearances for myself and Kana's sake.

"It's a pleasure to meet you," I say with a bow.

Because Hikari's playing her role, I sink into mine too - although I can't fight the corners of my lips arching upwards. I know Hikari despises every single second of our roleplay, but I'm finding this whole scenario horrendously hilarious.

"Kana-chan has told me so much about you."

I don't need to turn around to know that, with her eyes, Kara is drilling holes into the back of my skull. She's going to roast me when we get home. I'm not even hypothesising. I know she will.

"Thank you for taking the time to come during your work schedule. It is a shame we have to meet under these circumstances."

Hikari's doing a wonderful job at portraying a serious, reprimanding teacher. I'm tempted to tell her this, but it's already proving to be a challenging task keeping myself from grinning.

Yups, I'm glad I missed work for this.

"Does it have to do something with Kana beating up - uh, what's your name, kid?"

"Matsumoto Ryuichi." The boy finally speaks.

"Ah, Ryu-kun. Whatdya do?"

This time both Kana and Hikari are sending me withering glares.

Hikari explains, "Their history teacher found them both fighting on the floor during the fourth period. Kana wouldn't stop until the teacher had to rip her off Ryuichi. When asked why she did it, she wouldn't tell us."

My amusement simmers down. I gaze back at Kana-chan, who is currently avoiding my eye contact. Her palms are gripped into fists, knuckles are grazed an angry red, and her bottom lip is trembling. My favourite girl generally knows how to control her emotions. Whatever that Ryuichi kid had said to trigger her must have been quite offensive. She can be a loose cannon when she's mad - I can say this because I've been on the receiving end.

"What happened?" I pull my seat closer to her, tugging at her blazer sleeve.

Blue eyes meet mine. "Nothing."

"Kana…"

"It's nothing. He likes to make fun of my accent. But this time he called me a gaijin in front of other classmates and I got angry." Kana frowns. She regretfully looks down at the desk, attempting to avoid everybody's stares in the room.

"So you hit him?"

"I didn't mean to hurt him. He was just being really annoying and he wouldn't keep quiet-"

There's more to this. Kana's struggling. I thought more of it to be a language barrier, but I didn't think the other students calling her names would get to her. She's usually stronger than this.

I've had my share of insults over the years, but never threw a punching tantrum like she had. Maybe it's a generation gap? However, I was born here...whereas Kana-chan was raised in France. I don't get offended easily because it was something I had lived with every day.

It makes sense that she'd get overly sensitive about somebody mocking her accent, especially when she was still getting used to the place and trying to fit in. Moving from France to Japan would have been such a culture shock to her, like how it had been when I had moved to France around her age.

"Inflicting violence amongst your peers is not the right way to go about it, Kana."

I lean back into my chair, "But didn't he ask for it?"

Hikari warns, "We do not condone this type of behaviour at our school. You are not meant to be praising Kana over this. She needs to apologise."

"Why does she need to say sorry?" I counter. "From how I see it, the kid joked about Kana's accent more than once - therefore, I'd consider this as a repetitive form of action. In my dictionary, this would mean that he's been bullying her. He's the one who started it."

Hikari folds her arms, glaring at me like I'm the one who is her student. "Mr Takaishi, can we discuss this in the hallway?"

Of course the 'can' means, we have to. These passive-aggressive Japanese undertones are things I'm still relearning. They're hella confusing.

I follow her lead.

As soon as the door closes behind me, she groans out, "Takeru!"

Uh, so it's no longer Mr Takaishi? I'm relieved she's not addressing me by my surname because it's so weird coming out of her mouth.

"Can you not be so difficult?" Hikari exhales, "You're not letting me do my job. Why are you undermining my authority?"

"I'm not. I'm only saying it how it is. I stand by what I said."

"We're not in France anymore," she counters me. "It's different here. We have rules to abide by. We have etiquette and structure-"

"A rigid structure?" I say. "Or are you saying that foreigners don't have structure?"

"I'm not saying that! Stop putting words into my mouth."

"Then what are you trying to say?" I reply.

"She shouldn't have hit him."

"And he shouldn't have been bullying her. Kana was standing up for herself-"

"Then do you think that beating somebody to a pulp is the right thing to do? You're setting a bad example to your daughter."

"Daughter?!"

I raise an eyebrow at her, completely taken off guard by her remark. She thinks Kana-chan is my daughter? Christ. I may not have the best reputation, but damn.

"Kana-chan's fourteen," I state.

"So?"

"Do the maths, Hikari," I roll my eyes. "Do you really think that as soon as I landed in France I immediately found a girl to knock up? I was fifteen!"

"How would I know, Takeru!" she exclaims. "It's not like you told me anything or even had the luxury of keeping in contact with me. I just assumed-"

"Well, you're wrong. Kana-chan's my younger sister," I say.

"Fine. Your sister was acting inappropriately today." Hikari's words are less impactful.

Nevertheless, I reply, "I still think you should investigate this. Ryu-kun is also in the wrong here."

I smile, knowing it'll rile her up. "Maybe you need to shake up the structure a bit, Yagami sensei? If you stick by those old and lousy rules, nothing will change."

"What would you know?"

"I know," I admit. No point denying it anyway. "But I also know that you're better than this."

She puffs her cheeks. Something she used to do a lot when she'd cave in to agreeing with one of my devious plans. She was always there to hold my hand from going overboard. There's a reason why Taichi and Yamato got scolded and into more trouble by the adults when we were kids. I don't know if it's applicable in this current situation, but having her on my side has always been a trump card whenever I'd stir trouble.

I'm getting skittish waiting for her reply. Although she's a heavy boulder to convince, it's always fun when she agrees to go ahead with my over-the-top plans. Only this time, I'm only getting her to stand up for my sister - in an impossible rigid schooling system.

Hikari's always hated this about me - how I'd test the waters and experiment with things that should be left untouched. Albeit, deep down Hikari is a curious person. She might have changed, but she mostly means well and usually fights for what she thinks is right. Me questioning and reasoning with her is throwing her off her ball game.

"I'll see what I can do-"

Her sentence is cut short when a middle-age woman pushes her way through us, opening the door and hurrying into the classroom.

"MY BABY! WHO DID THIS TO YOU!?"

Hikari sighs. "I'll see what I can do, but a black eye is a black eye, Takeru."

"All the more challenging."

"Get fucked," she mutters under her breath as she dives into the drama.

Maybe there's still hope in our friendship after all? I chuckle to myself as I join the commotion.

Yes, this is definitely worth skipping work.

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(a/n) I've actually had 90% of this chapter written a month ago, but RL stuff has been giving me a mindfuck.

Introduced some new characters in this chapter. I'm glad I can finally use Catherine again. It's been a minute. And I've added a new character to the mix - Kana. Anyway, thanks for reading :)

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*Gaikokujin, kakkoi desu yo ne~ - (That foreigner is cool, isn't he?)
**Gaikokujin/Gaijin - (foreigner - kind of a derogatory term)
***Où est ma mère? - (Where's mother?)