Hey guys, it's Anya! I'm really tired and I'm going to head off to bed now but I thought I would load up chapters 9 and 10 before I went to bed. I really like these chapters, and I hope you all enjoy them! Also, I want to explain the ages that I'm using (based off of the actual anime) only one or two of them are guesses, but here they are:
Amu's Age = X (So just add or subtract from Amu's age, which is 13)
Ikuto = X + 5
Kuukai = X + 1
Utau = X + 2
Yaya = X - 1
Rima, Tadase, & Nagihiko = X
Amu is currently in 8th grade/second year in junior high (Japanese school year ends in late March/early April). Ikuto already graduated high school, and Utau is in her first year of high school, Kuukai is a third year, Yaya is a first year, and Rima, Tadase, and Nagihiko are all second years like Amu. I hope that can clarify things in future chapters!
Last quick note, is that I have to start writing a story for my creative writing club at my school, but I'm not so sure if that'll affect my fanfiction writing or not. We'll see soon. ;D

Chapter Ten

When I arrived at school that day, nothing seemed too out of the ordinary. Ryuu-san was back, and she was her usual, strict self. I had decided not to tell her about my father; besides, he had probably already forgotten about me and ended up going back to the bar for another drink. I was quite glad that Ryuu-san was now back at home, I had actually kind of missed her pushing her values onto me.

The moment I entered the halls, something didn't seem quite right. People all around me changed their loud voices to low whispers. Some gave me disgusted looks, while others gave me glances that seemed to say, "I knew it."

I ignored them completely. Besides, what could they do? It was probably just a coincidence… right?

"I mean, how can she be so immoral?" I heard a girl from the first year class speaking loudly. Her back was facing me, so she couldn't see me staring at her. I also assumed her eyes were closed, too, because her friends all had worried looks on their faces, putting a finger up to their lips, trying to silence her. "Seriously, how can she just go around like that and not have a guilty conscience—"

One of her friends put her hand over her mouth. The other hand was up to her lips with only the index finger sticking up; she was obviously trying to get her to shut her mouth. My stare hardened, what was everyone acting so strange about?

That's when I saw it on the wall, the large, colorful poster with the large letters written on it. I could see a picture of myself looking insanely ticked off, and an arm was around my shoulders. There he was with a smile, Tsukiyomi Ikuto. In large block letters above our picture it said, "Hinamori-san's" and below the picture it said, "Latest Scandal: Sleeping Around?"

My blood was boiling. Who had taken this picture? Better yet, who had decided to post this in the same room as the shoe lockers, where everyone could see it? I flipped my hair and walked over to my shoe locker. Our lockers were arranged by ABC order, grades and class numbers didn't matter. While I exchanged my outdoor shoes with my school shoes, a rather feminine looking boy was staring at me. I looked at the shoe locker where he had been exchanging his shoes before he begun staring at me. The name plate said his name was Hotori Tadase.

He had blonde hair cut into a rather fashionable style. I seemed to recall him being the student council president, despite only being a second year, like me. I gave him a stern, intimidating look. I asked coldly, "What do you want?"

A small blush covered his cheeks. He looked down and while slipping into his school shoes he stuttered, "N-nothing."

He closed his locker and left, in a sort of rush. I slipped into my school shoes, wondering how a shy boy like that could become student council president. I decided to shake it off; it didn't matter to me, anyways. I slid my umbrella into my shoe locker; I saw no point in carrying it around school. I slung my back pack –which was like a messenger back— back over my shoulder and walked up to the poster of me and Ikuto.

"Really, who has this much free time?" I spoke aloud; I didn't care if anyone heard me. I turned around, I was making sure that I looked irritated yet intimidating and scary, but still keeping my cool composure that the students had labeled me with. "Honestly," I spoke louder this time, so everyone could hear me. Most heads were already turned towards me, but the few that hadn't been looking were looking over at me now. "If anyone has a problem with me, please confront me. Don't spread rumors, they're troublesome and a waste of my time and yours."

With one fatal sweep, the poster was torn off of the wall. The corners were still there, but it didn't matter to me. I crumpled up the poster, still managing to keep my cool composure. I tossed it upwards and drop-kicked it into the nearest trash can. The crumpled up poster landed in the trash can perfectly.

The kids around me gasped. Some people said that my actions only made me seem guiltier, while others said that my cool composure and calm reaction to the poster proved me innocent. I, however, didn't really care as long as I could forget about Ikuto as soon as possible. Since I was walking home today I was going to be sure to walk in the rain without an umbrella. I wanted to start anew as soon as possible.

"Yo, Hinamori!" I was about to walk into my classroom when an upperclassmen came up to me. I was in my second year of middle school, so I had a grade both below and above me. He had spiky orange hair going out in all sorts of directions and his eyes were a deep green. If I recalled, he was Souma Kuukai, the secretary of the student council and also the captain of the basketball team and the co-captain of the soccer team. A big smile was on his face, as if everything was right with his world.

I gave him a cold stare. "What do you want?"

Kuukai ignored my coldness and continued, "The student council wants to meet with you at lunch. Do you mind?"

"It's a bother." I told him straightforward, the harshness obvious in my voice.

He patted my head and replied with a big, goofy smile, "See you at lunch in the student council room!"

I flipped my hair and walked into my classroom, class 2-A. As I walked over to my seat, everyone from my class stared at me. Once I got over to my seat that was in the third row all the way on the side of the room closest to the door, I slammed my backpack onto my desk. I looked up at everyone around me and asked harshly, "Do any of you have a problem?"

Everyone returned to what they were doing. The only one who was still staring at me was a kid named Fujisaki Nagihiko. Nagihiko had insanely long dark violet hair. His eyes shone a bright gold color, similar to mine except his were much richer. Nagihiko had quite a girly face, but his mid-tone voice and toned figure made you forget your doubts about his gender.

Now that I thought about it, Fujisaki Nagihiko was also on the student council. I believe he was the treasurer? Wait… why were all of these members of the student council coming up to talk to me? Were the vice president, Mashiro Rima, and the sub-treasurer, Yuiki Yaya, going to come up to me and talk to me as well? My mind returned to this morning, when Hotori Tadase had been staring at me. Perhaps he was trying to ask me to come to the student council room, too?

Nagihiko walked up to me, a small smile on his face. "I'm sorry for this inconvenience, Amu." Nagihiko was very polite, and he often called everyone by their given name instead of their family surname.

I raised an eyebrow at him. Why was he apologizing? "Whatever, it's not really my problem as to what people think, anyway."

"I'm glad that you're confident in yourself," Nagihiko replied politely. "However, this may also cause a disturbance among the school and your home life. So if you could come to the student council room during lunchtime that would be great for both parties."

I sighed. I retorted with a "Whatever," and took my seat. Nagihiko returned to his seat, as well, and class continued soon afterwards.

All throughout the day I was day dreaming. During fourth hour, the class before lunch, we had an algebra test. I finished the test within the first fifteen minutes, if I hadn't had to show my work I would've been done within ten minutes. I put my head down on the desk, hoping to get some sleep for the next forty-five minutes while the others took their tests.

"Hinamori-san," My algebra teacher, Yabuki-sensei, was kneeling next to my desk. She asked me, "Since you're done, do you want to go to over to the home economics room with class 3-B?"

My head arose from the desk and I replied, "Why not."

I put all of my stuff away into my backpack and turned in my test. In exchange for my test Aizawa-sensei handed me a pass to the school's kitchen, where class 3-B was currently taking home economics class. On my way over to the home economics classroom, I tried to look for anymore posters that might have been hung up. I couldn't see any on my way over to the home economics room, so I sighed with relief as I knocked on the door.

"Yes?" The teacher, Aizawa-sensei, slid the door open just enough to poke his head out. Aizawa-sensei had always been a reserved teacher. He had tanned skin and short black hair, and behind a pair of rimless glasses sat a pair of dark brown eyes. He looked at me up and down and recognized me almost immediately, I was often sent to the home economics room since I was already ahead in my class, and he said, "Oh, Hinamori-san, please come in."

He slid open the door all the way and let me come into the kitchen. I walked in until I was just a few meters in front of the door. I looked over at the work stations, a bunch of upperclassmen were in the middle of cooking something. Everyone stopped almost immediately to watch me walk into the classroom.

"Hinamori-san, you can go help Souma-kun at his table in the back." Aizawa-sensei informed me while pointing to the same orange-headed boy I knew.

I tried not to grimace as I walked back to where Kuukai was. Kuukai was probably the last person I wanted to see then. As I walked to the back of the classroom where Kuukai was, the upperclassman began whispering about the poster from this morning. Whoever put that poster up on the wall was going to pay once I got a hold of them. I knew how to break people from the inside out depending on my words, so I wasn't going to let this get in my way.

"Hinamori, what's up?" Kuukai greeted me with the same goofy smile of his. His tanned skin had dashes of flour here and there, making his appearance goofier than ever.

I sighed and asked, "What are we baking?"

Kuukai took the recipe sheet from the side of the table; both his hands and the sheet covered in flour, and showed me the picture. He said, "We're supposed to make muffins."

Kuukai didn't move from the spot he was standing in with the flour over his face and the sheet held out with his flour covered hands. He looked… he looked like such a total nut. The fact that he was completely oblivious to how stupid he looked was almost too funny to bear.

"We have a lot of work to do…" I gave him a you-are-totally-hopeless sigh and started helping him with the baking.

Home economics was actually… fun. I tried not to show it in front of Kuukai, but I actually enjoyed this class for once. When we began I was acting completely serious, but Kuukai eventually got me to break down from my seriousness by flicking flour at me and getting it all over my face and in my hair. I couldn't help but flick back; no way in hell was I going to let him get away with that. We practically had a flour war; we were almost covered head to toe in flour before Aizawa-sensei came up to us and asked us to calm down. I never really laughed or smiled, but I was still able to keep my cool, apathetic complexion while having fun.

After the muffins were made and we were all cleaned up, home economics finally ended. It was finally lunch time, which I had completely forgotten, was when I was supposed to meet the student council. Kuukai, unfortunately, was part of that student council. Although I tried to breakaway, Kuukai ended up dragging me to my worst nightmare, also known as the student council room.

What awaits Amu in the student council room? And what's going on with Amu and Kuukai? Look out for chapter 11: 'Can Broken Hearts Be Mended?' Until next time!

Please Review! *w*