There's nothing like the first day of school, right?
New grade level, new teacher, new stuff to learn, new classmates, and new friends. This story's about is actually about an old friend.
He's right there right now, at his locker.
He's got on the school uniform, a blue unzipped hoodie jacket over it, a green and black watch, and there's a green pencil behind his right ear and glasses leg.
This is Ace; last name: Daimu. 'Dai' [大] means big or great, and 'mu' [夢] means dream.
He lives with his dad, older brother and sister.
Now back to the 'old friend' thing. In a way, Ace was a big dreamer; he wants to help out and have fun in life as much as he can. Ace was a friendly and confident person growing up. He'd always see a problem, turn it around, and find something good about it. He was always resourceful. The main way he was resourceful was, well, you'll see later.
Here's where the 'old friend' part comes into play.
Said boy just closed his locker at the same time a girl turned the corner into the locker room. When she saw him, she stopped. It wasn't due to nervousness, or fright, it was because, she recognized him.
Ace got up and left the locker room, leaving the girl just standing there.
"...Could it really be him?"
The girl was thinking to herself as she sat in her desk. For some people it would be really hard to do that when there's about thirty other people looking at you. I'm not kidding, literally everyone else in class is staring at the girl.
Makes sense because she's the most beautiful girl that came to this school. This girl is Shouko Komi, by the way. She's a diamond compared to everyone else, prove me wrong, but there is one problem that she has.
She's not good at communication or making friends.
Don't get me wrong, anyone would love being friends with her, it's just that she's not good at talking to people. She just, stares. She's actually a kind person, but without her saying something, it just looks like you got on her bad side.
Well, there was one person that became friends with her at childhood.
He was her best, first, and only friend she had. Despite her not being able to speak, he never found her boring, upsetting, or treated her differently.
Even though she wasn't much of a talker, he could always understand what she meant.
Then there was the first time she spoke to him. Even though she was nervous, and she stuttered and hesitated a bit, she managed to say 'Hello' and his name.
It was all good. That was until he moved away four years ago without a word. She hasn't seen him since.
"...Hard to do work when there's people giving you death glares." A voice next to her said.
She looked to her left, and there he was, the boy from earlier. In his hands was his green pencil and some colored paper. He looked around at everyone, nodded his head, and waited for class to start.
The teacher told everyone to introduce themselves. "Excuse me?" Ace said, raising his hand, "Can I go last?" The teacher allowed it.
What was Ace's plan? He was waiting for everyone to say their names and show themselves, then, he'd work his magic.
Komi on the other hand, couldn't pay attention to anything. She was focused on Ace.
After everyone, including Komi who just wrote on the chalkboard instead of speaking, introduced themselves, Ace stood up and said, "Hey everyone, look up." Confused they all did that. "Now look at your desks." The second they did, they were all surprised.
On everyone's desks, were little origami versions of themselves. Now that's something you don't see every day.
"My name's Ace Daimu, and I'm a quick artist. My special is origami. Anything involving paper and drawing, I'll have it done in less than three minutes!"
That confirmed Komi's thoughts as she looked at her mini-me.
It's lunch break now, and the classroom's empty.
Well, not entirely empty. Ace's resting his eyes and leaning back in his seat, arms behind his head.
"Miss me, Shouko?"
Said girl jumped back in surprise. She was looking at Ace for a very long time. He sat upright and looked at her, then noticed a small origami cat in her hands. "Hey, you kept it." he said.
That cat was what Ace gave Komi a long time ago when they first became friends. Even though she couldn't tell him, he could tell that she liked it.
She didn't know what to say right now. It's not like she could anyway.
"Welp, see ya!" Ace suddenly said getting up, surprising Komi. He walked to the exit, only to be stopped by small tug on his jacket. Smirking he turned around and saw Komi holding onto his jacket.
Ace raised his eyebrow. Ace's smirk became a smile after knowing what she couldn't say.
"Alright. I won't go.
Even though she couldn't talk back, the two were talking using the chalkboard.
It started with how their day went, then it led on to a full conversation.
After that, Ace wrote on the board:
I'm sorry.
Ace looked at Komi who looked at the words on the board. He kept writing:
I didn't mean to just leave you without saying something. It just happened suddenly.
It wasn't my decision, my dad said that he got a job in America, and we moved, and I didn't get a chance to tell you. Every day, I wished I could see you one more time.
I missed you, Shouko.
He looked back at her and looking at her, she looked like she was on the verge of tears. She went to the board and wrote something down then out of nowhere, hugged Ace tight.
I missed you too, Ace.
"You still weren't able to make friends? Not one? The entire time I was gone?" Ace asked as they both walked down the halls, people watching along the way.
She didn't talk at all the entire time.
"Don't stress, Shouko." he said, putting his arm around her shoulder, making everyone around angry or jealous, "No matter the cost, I will help you make friends."
That's Ace for you. He always helps Komi in any situation.
"Hey, Shouko, remember this?" He switched his glasses with fake paper ones in his jacket. They were white, had black antennas, and had black pupils for eyes. Beats me how he made them work like googly eyes.
He marched in a circle around Komi, stood in front of her, then shook his head doing jazz hands. There was a small and very short giggle from her that everyone heard and adored.
He always found a way to make her laugh.
"Hey, I'm feeling eyes on me, is there people staring at me?" Komi didn't know how to tell him, but there was a bunch of boys around the corner giving Ace death glares.
It's been less than a day, and Komi already has a fan club.
"I thought so." He took off his paper glasses, unfolded them with a quick wrist flick, and refolded the paper into a boomerang.
He threw the boomerang around the corner and miraculously it hit all the boys in head and knocked them unconscious.
Wait, how?! It was paper!
When it came back in his hand, he unfolded it then refolded it back into the glasses. He put them back in his jacket and put his real glasses on.
See what I mean about him being resourceful?
It was the end of the day and the two were about to leave and go home.
"Hey, Shouko." She turned to him and saw him reach into his jacket. He pulled out a notepad and pen and gave it to her.
Look, Shouko's known him for a while, but she'll never understand how all his paper and art supplies fit in that jacket with Ace.
"This is for you. I had it incase we might meet again. Now, anytime your too nervous to speak, you can write down what you want to say."
Komi looked at the smile on Ace's face. She opened the notepad, wrote something down, and showed it to him.
Thank you.
"You're welcome. Hey, I gotta go. Don't tell your mom I'm back in town just yet for me, would you? I want it to be a surprise."
She gave him a nod.
He pulled out more paper and folded it into a crown and placed it on her head.
"I'll see you tomorrow. Trust me, I won't leave you again." He waved her goodbye and left.
When Shouko arrived in her room, she took off the crown from her head, and down on her desk.
She thought about something for a second and opened the desk's drawer and pulled out a small picture frame and put it next to the crown. She also pulled out the origami cat and small Komi from her pocket and put it next to the frame also.
What was in the frame? A picture of Komi and Ace when they were younger. In the picture, he was teaching her how to fold a paper crane. Her mom took the picture and thought it was cute.
Looking at it, a small smile appeared on her face.
Meanwhile...
Ace in his room is seen turning off his phone on a tripod. In front of the phone and tripod was Ace's desk and on that was a small origami ace in a different outfit.
The small Ace was wearing a dark grey T-shirt with red scratch decals on it, a black jacket over it, jeans, black shoes, and holding an axe with a spade on it.
This is what Ace does in his spare time: he makes videos using the origami creations he crafts.
DoubleA135 got this idea from the Paper Mario series.
What can I say? He's right. Keep an eye out for references in future chapters.
Ace took his phone off the tripod and plugged it into the laptop on a different desk. He then started editing the footage he took.
"And...done!"
He uploaded the video.
Leaning back in his chair, he thought out loud, "Today's been great. Made a great first impression, kinda, made a new video, and Shouko and I are friends after all this time."
"Did you say 'Shouko?'"
Turning around, he saw his older sister, Diaya Diamu.
She's the same skin tone as Ace, has glasses on, her long dark hair in a ponytail, and is wearing a white shirt, jean jacket, black pants, and grey shoes.
"Hey, Diaya. What's up?" "Not much. I was about to go out until I heard that you say Shouko's name!" "C'mon, not this again." "But you two are made for each other! You've known her most of your life, and you don't want to go out with her?" "Sis!"
She always did this to him.