Bowing slightly Atsuko thanked the tall man in front of her, Tom had made Shizuo walk his precious little sister to Raira Academy where she would begin her job as a tutor for students. Shizuo was actually a little relieved to see that the Tanaka girl actually had some style after how she had been dressed with her stupid yellow scarf the other day. She actually took the time to do her hair back into a sleek chignon, and dress in suitably casual office attire.
"I'll see you and Tom at six?" She asked looking up at Shizuo
Exhaling a stream of smoke he nodded "Yeah, we're going to this new Korean barbeque place"
Shooting him a dazzling smile she hurried off into the building, clipping her ID badge onto her pink cashmere sweater.
"Tanaka-san!" An elderly woman bustled over to greet her, "I'm Miyano Rin, we spoke on the phone"
"Oh, hello there Miyano-san" Atsuko grinned
"We've got your own private office, granted, it's rather small, but it's large enough to hold you and a small Chemistry lab"
"Oh good! I was hoping you'd allow me to recreate a few of the assignments!" The charcoal haired girl beamed
"You have two classes, the sixth and seventh block, sixth is a creative writing class that no teacher had time for, and seventh is a remedial history class. Then there is the two hour tutoring sessions after school" Rin nodded, fluffing her white hair "I trust you can handle that"
Atsuko found her classroom in one of the remote corners of the academy, she briefly wondered if her students would be heathens. The bell rang for sixth block, startling her, and a few students wandered into her room.
"Eh? You're far too young to me Tanaka-sensei" A girl stared at Atsuko "I heard Tanaka-sensei was supposed to be an old man!"
Checking her roster she found she only had ten students in this class, and four in the next. Either these children were the daftest of the bunch or the school was humoring her. Flipping to her after school schedule she found she tutored different subjects on different day. And this Monday was History after school. She absolutely hated history.
Looking at the ten students she smiled, "I am in fact Tanaka Atsuko, but since apparently I'm an old man, you can call me Ojiisan"
A blonde boy in the front bust into a fit of giggles before raising his hand "Ojiisan?"
"Yes…" glancing down at her seating chart she found his name "Masaomi-kun?"
"Are you for real about the Ojiisan thing?" He asked tugging at the collar of his hoodie
Deadpanning she replied "No, you can refer to me as Sensei, Tanaka-sensei, or Atsuko-sensei. I have no real preference."
"You don't seem like a very capable teacher" A heavily tanned girl called from the back
"You don't seem like a very capable student, Ayame-chan" Atsuko shook her head before perching on her desk "Now, I trust you all have your writer's notebooks?"
There was silence. Atsuko let her head fall into her palm. How could you sign up for a class and not have the one basic material needed?
"Well then, if no one has their notebook, I suppose we can do introductions" She sighed, resisting the urge to start strangling the children in front of her, and the feeling persisted for about three weeks.
She thanked the stars as the bell rang. After five minutes of waiting for students to show up for tutoring, she decided to ditch. It was Wednesday after all, and she was pretty hungry. Grabbing her purse she slung it over her shoulder, ready to lock her office/classroom door.
"Atsuko-chan!" A cry came from down the hall, "Don't leave Atsuko-chan!"
Atsuko's head jerked up to take in the sight of one Kida Masaomi running breathlessly down the hall, flailing wildly to gain her attention. It crossed her mind to take off running from him, she could fake a family emergency, say that Tom-nii had been crushed by a stray vending machine thrown by Shizuo-san. She resigned not to run and simply unlocked her door. Masaomi darted into the classroom and threw his bag on a desk, before sitting down and attempting to catch his breath.
She stared blandly at him, he was stopping her from getting a decent cup of coffee and a snack, oh, dango would've been great, there was this little shop about three blocks from the academy where she could-
"Atsuko-chan?" Masaomi waved his hand in front of his spacey teacher's face
"You can't call me Atsuko-chan" She snapped "It'll get me fired"
"Yeah, yeah, whatever" The bleach blonde boy waved his hand airily "I need your help on a paper about Che Guevara"
"I've got a book about him at home if you'd like to borrow it Masaomi-kun" She smiled before whispering to him conspiratorially "It's got all the important parts highlighted from my time at the university"
"Oh Suko-chan, that'd be great!" He grinned "maybe we could go get it now?"
"I don't get off until six" She shook her head "But I'll have it for you tomorrow"
"Well, maybe on Friday, I could treat you to some sushi for all your help?" He pressed
She nearly recoiled, this little blonde boy was trying to hit on her. Well, he had to be like seventeen, so it wasn't so bad…no! She studied the eager boy in front of her, his shaggy blonde hair reminded her of Shizuo, though Shizuo's was much lighter. Taking notice of his ear cuff on his right ear, her hand wandered up to feel the one on her left ear. He was a good deal taller than her, though, come to think of it, a lot of people were.
So she took the plunge "Alright, just sushi, nothing more, okay?"
His eyes glittered "Thank you! Now would you pretty please help me with my math homework?"