"I'm sorry, but you just haven't been here long enough, and on top of that, freshmen usually have to go through inner school internship before they can actually be a part of the school paper…much less be working on stories. Are you sure you don't want to sign up for that?"

I could already tell by the way that he was talking that there was simply no way this was happening. Not today at least, but if there was one thing I'd learned about journalism, other than fact checking that is, you had to have persistence. But this wasn't America; Japan is a whole different monster, and I'd learned that quickly. And while persistence was a good quality to have, it wasn't good to have it be the only one being noticed. I sighed,

"Not even if a freshman had great credentials?"

His eyes turned apologetic, but I could hear a patronizing lace in his tone,

"They would have to be outstanding, but…seeing as you're from not only another school, but another country…"

I pinched the bridge of my nose. I'd been warned about bigotry, and now I couldn't help but see it everywhere, even if it wasn't really there. Paranoia tends to do that.

"But, it is still possible I suppose, but you'd have to have something different, something more than hard hitting. I really do advise going for the internship, even with being out of country, you've learned the language and the written structure, I have no doubt that you'd be able to have a spot next year."

Next year?! No, no no no, I wouldn't spend an entire year with nothing to do in the newspaper other than changing toner and learning formatting I already had in my head better than my past addresses. I wouldn't, I couldn't. I needed this.

"I'll think about it…"

But I already knew what my answer would be next week, next month. Sometimes you had to give to get what you wanted, and the relief on his expression showed me that I'd chosen the right words. With a low dip of my head, I thanked him for his time and gathered up my pack. My hip was still getting used to the constant bang of it, but walking around in a formal dress with a backpack wasn't exactly…proper etiquette for Ouran Academy.

Nothing about this place fit right to me, not the people, the hallways, the dresses. I never really was one for wearing dresses, and now here I was wearing them every single day. I didn't hate dresses, not really, they were just hard to move around in really fast. Aside from the custardy color, they weren't too bad, just not what I'd choose for everyday attire. One good thing though: I wouldn't have to spend an hour in front of my open closet to figure out what I'd need to wear.

So here I was, walking down the hallways having everything ahead of me but the one thing I truly wanted. I wasn't used to getting whatever I wanted, but I was used to having something pay off so long as you worked hard for it. Amazing, me having lived in America, but something people didn't really tend to understand was that being in middle school and high school really was where you'd have the most opportunity. Aside from bullying, when it came to hard work you usually got what you were working towards. Popularity contests could mug that up, but I'd never really let that stop me. It didn't help that I had managed to stay on their good side though.

Which brings me to where I am now: the new kid, and not just any new kid...an American new kid. As if things could get any more awkward. The one thing I had going for me was that I didn't look too American. Oh, I was still an outsider, but a different type of outsider. My olive skin -compliments of my Italian heritage- and dark long curly hair had me look just far enough from Caucasian that I could pass as something more "exotic" and less "foreign". There were still the side long glances and whispers, as is customary to every new kid in school, but I'd never been one to show weakness and I wasn't about to start the habit now.

All I cared about was getting onto that damn paper. I'd been on the fast track to editor by the time I was a junior, back at my old school, but then dad got stationed overseas. In the middle of a divorce at that. He stayed on base in Okinawa, but mom was lucky enough to find a place in the Kanto region. During the week I stayed with her and on the weekends I'd make the painfully lengthy trip to Okinawa to see dad. It wasn't so bad during the summer, but now with school in full swing and the fall schedule in effect...let's just say I was starting to feel cultural jet lag.

Ouran Academy offered housing, but it didn't really look all that great to have to take up residence on school grounds: some of the scholarship kids did that, but I wasn't on scholarship and I didn't need anything else to mark off on my "get beaten up and thrown into the fountain" list. Though I will say, being a loner was almost just as common as being around tons of people over here. Not to say that I was a "loner" by nature, I just always found myself by myself more often than not. I work better like that, and if there's one thing I'm good at, it's working. Aside from others on the paper or in my creative writing classes, I didn't really converse with others unless it was via a game headset...but I couldn't even remember the last time I'd powered up one of my consoles.

When you're tenacious there's no room for going out to parties or weekend movies and mall trips. And don't even get me started on boys. If there was ever anything more pointless to have to deal with during school it was members of the opposite sex. Honestly I don't get what all of the hype is about them. Or dating in general for that matter.

There'd be plenty of time for that when I was the editor in chief of The New York Times.