"Antonio~! No one picked her up! Can we keep her?" I held up "my" kitty to the Spaniard with huge begging eyes, "I've already got a name picked out and everything!"

Antonio chuckled, "Oh heck with it, sure."

"Pookiiiiiie!" I squealed, racing to my room with my now "official" pet. It's official, right?

"Lovi~nooo! We can keep her! We can keep Pookie!"

My brother glared at me. He was reading a book and didn't wanna be bothered, from the looks of it.

"What the fuck, dumbass? I'm obviously not as into that fucking cat as you are."

"Oh..."

"Ugh...sorry...I'm just...really into this book..."

"Watcha reading?" my mood instantly changed back to being chipper.

"N-Not important..."

I looked over his shoulder.

"Ooo, that looks really romantic!" I admired the book. The cover was black with a red heart in the middle. The title was in calligraphy writing, so I couldn't really make out the title.

"Gah! N-No...it's about...a guy who...rips out people's hearts..?" he thought a little too quickly. My face fell.

"W-Why would you read something like that?" I whimpered, backing up a little.

"Wait...no it's not...like that...dammit bastard I wouldn't have to make things up like that if you'd just stop being so fucking nosey!"

"Sorry, fratello!"

He sighed in frustration and looked back into his novel. I sat our bed and played with my new kitten friend. Then I realized something. I looked at our calendar. Tomorrow was marked as "first day of school".

"Aaah! Lovi! Tomorrow we go to school, how fun!"

"Duh, I already knew that dumbass..." he sounded a little bit spacey. Must've been a good book...

I frowned. He's no fun when he isn't paying attention.

:::::::

The next day, we were woken by the cheery sound of Antonio saying, "Good morning, boys!"

"Morning!" I replied.

"Hn..." Lovino wasn't fully awake. He was naturally a late riser.

"Let's get ready for school!" Antonio leaned against the door frame in our room.

"Okay!" I flung off the comforter blanket and jumped off the bed.

"Ehhh, leave me alone bastard..." muttered my half-conscious (only slightly) older brother. I stared at him, wishing he hadn't said that. But to my surprise, Antonio only chuckled. What a laid-back guy!

When Lovino finally got up, with my help, of course, (what would he do without me, heehee) I made him help me pick out my clothes, even though he didn't "give a fuck", or whatever that means. We ate breakfast (he gave us Spanish foods!) and all that other regular morning stuff.

"You seem to be used to the school day routine, ve!" I pointed out, slipping a my arms through a jacket sleeve.

"Well, uh, I have to babysit my brother's kids very much often...you didn't hear it from me, but he's a bad parent."

"Aah.."

Our foster father led us to the bus-stop after we had packed our backpacks. We were early, so I sat down on the curb and began to sketch in a notebook I had bought for no intended school purposes. It was hard to keep control over your pencil when you're shivering so hard though. It was only November but it felt like January, how queer. I stuffed my makeshift sketchbook and pencil into my backpack as the bright yellow bus labeled 316 pulled up to the stop sign. I grabbed Lovino's (practically frozen, wow) hand and ran to the bus.

"Bye-bye, Antonio~!" I waved as I walked up the stairs into the bus with my fratello.

"Let my hand go, bastard!" Lovino demanded of me, puffing his cheeks.

"Aw but I'm nervous..." I clutched his arm.

"Agh..."

We sat down in an empty seat in the back...well, Lovino chose it...he said he uses back seats as a sort of excuse not to talk to anybody. But it seems someone else had the same idea because a blonde boy came to the back and seemed disappointed the back seat was taken (there's one seat on the left in the back so it leaves room for a fire exit) by some people. It was three to a seat and all other seats were full so he took a seat right next to me. Grinning at him didn't seem to catch his attention. So I decided to talk to him.

"Hiya!"

The boy seemed to be spacing out a bit, but hearing my voice brought him back.

"Uh...hi..."

His eyes were a lovely shade of purple...like lavender! He wore a soft looking, light colored scarf and a beige jacket. His Russian accent was thick, which hinted he hadn't moved to Italy too long ago. But that was not surprising. The school that we had been registered into was for people who moved from other countries, or bilingual kids...or in our case, people who had to learn another language. Antonio thought it'd be helpful if we'd learn Spanish.

"What's your name?" I asked, trying to engage in conversation.

"Ivan..."

"Wow, really? I met this really silly girl once named Ivan!"

The Russian boy glared at me. Oh crap, it sounds like I just told him he had a girl's name!

"Oh uh-" I tried to fix it.

"Why do you try to talk to me if you're just going to insult me?!"

"N-No I'm sorry, I didn't mean it like that...um...my name is Feliciano, or Feli...you can make fun of my name!"

Ivan stared down at his feet for a few seconds, and I began to think he was giving me some sort of a silent treatment, until he let out a bit of a laugh, "Ufu!"

I looked at him and smiled, "It is a funny name, isn't it?"

Being the one who stays in good humor is kind of my thing. Even if it means making fun of myself.

"Stop being so loud, I'm reading..." Lovino had his face in his romance novel.

Ivan turned his head to look at the cover of Lovino's book. Chuckling was his first reaction.

"I saw my little sister reading that book once."

My brothers face turned red from embarrassment. Ivan laughed into his scarf quietly and then gave him an apologetic look.

"Sorry I just needed to point that out."

Suddenly we were all thrown forward a little and our faces squished against the seat in front of us. Lovi's squished face is funny~!

"What the hell?!"

"How can you not know? This bus has bad breaks," Ivan explained, giving Lovino a questioning look.

"First day here," I told him.

"Aah."

I looked out the window. School. A big, big school. Whoa! Squashing my brother a bit, (he yelled at me, of course) I pressed my nose against the little window and looked at the gorgeous looking building. Since when is school beautiful? Since now! The bus-driver opened the door and the middle-schoolers came flooding out. I stood up and nodded at Ivan.

"It was nice to meet you, I hope we can talk again soon~!"

"Da."

Pulling my brother (who still was reading his book) along, I looked up at our new school.

"Fratello! This is gonna be fun!"

Lovino grunted and didn't look up.