A/N: Fixed an error in which Hisao magically knew Kenji's last name without being told. Also, it was the wrong last name.


It is to mixed feelings that I wake up, having not dreamed at all, or at least not recalling any.

I forgot to set up an alarm, but it's still rather dark out, so I'm not missing school. Checking my phone reveals that the time is six-thirty, well over an hour before I need to show up to school.

Given this unexpected blessing, I take the opportunity to set up everything that I should have done earlier.

School uniforms find their way onto a metal rack in my small closet. Medications are placed onto my bedside desk, two pills palmed and swallowed without water. I'm not low on money at all - before I came here, I worked as a library assistant and made some decent funds, with almost nothing to spend it on.

And that's not even putting into consideration my second job…

My tuition is being covered by the government, though I have to maintain a grade limit to keep the scholarship. I'll have no problems with that, either, so I have plenty of money, not counting my own college savings. Of course, I won't go anywhere expensive. I'm not particularly ambitious or needy in that aspect.

But I'll be here for just under a school year, pending disaster, so I may as well take the chance to liven up the place a little. I wonder if I can get a small refrigerator; creature comforts like that would go a long way in making this room mine, however temporary.

My school books go into a small wooden drawer in my desk, one of four. The lonely emptiness reminds me of my continuing need to visit a library, and I should try to get my hands on a computer at some point. I can't exactly wander off to the public one; or can't I?

Assuming this town has a library, that is.

I grab a few toiletries and walk outside, darting towards the hall's bathroom. Running a shower quickly, I sigh in relief.

Feeling more refreshed than I have in a while, I brush my teeth, wrap a white towel around my waist, and dart back into my room, searching through my closet while drying myself off.

There it is. I slip on my school uniform, loosely tying the green tie around my neck. I'll tighten it later on, before class starts.

Filling a blue backpack with the required materials, I slip it around my shoulders and step outside, intending to find some sort of meal.

Immediately, I run into problems in the form of a young man with extremely thick glasses, dressed in the school uniform. For some reason, he has a red and yellow striped wool scarf wrapped tightly around his throat.
"Who are you?" He leans forward, uncomfortably close, as if he can't see me. Maybe he can't. Either way, I take a step back.

"Who are you?" I return. That's the question I should be asking, actually, since as far as I know the only neighbor I have…

"Who wants to know?" He shoots back, almost accusatorially, though I don't know what I would be accused of.

Alright, I give up. He doesn't appear to be particularly threatening, so I don't think there's any harm in telling him my name.

"Hisao Nakai. I live here now." I say. His face suddenly brightens in realization, and he stands back upright, thrusting his hand out in a greeting.

"Oh, 'sup dude? The name's Kenji." I'm startled by his sudden change in demeanor.

"Kenji? Do you happen to be living in the room with no nameplate?" I ask, and shake his sweaty hand. He has a firm grip. After he lets go, I discreetly wipe my hand on my slacks. If he notices, he doesn't comment.

"No. Not me. You must have the wrong guy. Goodbye." He says, before dashing past me into the aforementioned room and slamming it shut. A few seconds later, I hear the sound of several locks being snapped shut.

I shake my head and move on with my life. There's something terribly wrong with him, but I don't care enough to do anything about it.

I do care enough to pull out a permanent market and scribble in "Kenji" on his empty nameplate, though.

Given this free time, I think I'll tour the grounds. But where to? The library. Will it even be open at this ridiculous time?

Probably not, but I may as well figure out where it is. It should hopefully save some time when I have more free time, and I'll at least be able to determine its hours.

Stepping outside, I find myself back in the courtyard. It's, unsurprisingly, deserted, though the sun is up by now. The garden looks quite beautiful at this time of day, the sunlight reflecting off of the morning dew.

It's a soothing sight. Everything smells like grass, and flowers. Cherry blossoms, predominantly. The pink petals are gorgeous...but soon they will fall, as summer approaches.

A metaphor of some kind? Maybe. I'll think about it later, when I'm not so tired.

I step into the main building. It's, as far as I can tell, empty. I...guess it's a fine time for me to explore, since I'm not hungry enough for breakfast. I glance at the simple watch on my wrist. It's just after seven. There's still almost an hour before I have to be in class, and I'm already dressed.

Wandering aimlessly, I knock on doors, and, after a polite pause, peek inside. Most appear to be classrooms of some sort. There are a few teachers out and about, though they seem far too busy for me to want to disturb. I haven't yet run into any students...

Just as I think that, a short pink blur darts past me, almost colliding with me.

"Sorry!" A pink shirt of some sort, and red shorts. I recognize it as the female version of the PE uniform.

I realize that the little blonde girl doesn't have legs.

Well, she does, just not flesh or bone. Her pale and very much flesh-and-bone thighs end in shins and feet made of some black rubber or plastic-like material. They curve and end with a horizontal area to act as feet, I think. They look disturbingly artificial and unnatural.

I'm somewhat accustomed to seeing people missing limbs, but those replacements felt so out of place that I couldn't help but be surprised.

Before I say anything - not like I would have, I was too busy being shocked - she's gone, sprinting around the corner.

A girl with no legs...sprinting?

I get the distinct feeling that irony like that would be far more common at a school like this.

Shaking off my bemusement, I sigh tiredly before continuing my explorations, traveling to the second floor via the stairs. There's an elevator located next to it, but I figured that I may as well get this little exercise.

The second floor...is a carbon copy of the third floor. Speaking of which...

It's a quarter to eight. I didn't think I had spent that much time just walking around, but...I guess I do need to get to homeroom.

It seems like I will have to ask Shizune and Misha about the location of the library after all. That was surprisingly entertaining, just walking around like that.

I make it into my homeroom with a few minutes to spare. Actually, it's quite empty...but that same purple-haired girl from yesterday is here, reading what appears to be the same book from earlier.

I could sit by her, or I could sit by Misha and Shizune...

I try to slide into the seat as quietly as possible - moving silently is one of the things I'm good at. But even then, she still notices me, looking up with a startled expression on her face.

I'm honestly not sure what to do now. Do I say hello? I mean, I said two words to her yesterday, and a farewell at that. That feels...rather off. Though, in fairness, I remained silent out of consideration to her, and what I assumed she wanted.

So...do I break the ice today?

Eh...I'll leave it up to her. In case she doesn't want to talk, I'd rather not leave a clingy or irritating impression. After all, I am essentially invading her space. But if she wants to talk, then, well, I'm willing to. I think she would be quite the interesting conversationalist...if, well...

If she talked.

I sneak an occasional glance at her, monitoring her mood. Eventually, she relaxes somewhat. Not completely relaxed, of course, but not ready to spring out of her seat and flee at a moment's notice. It appears I was right. She prefers the silence, too.

I don't mind it myself. Perhaps we could get along.

Inevitably, though, our eyes lock, as she peers at me out from under the bangs she is hiding her scars behind. Immediately, I feel the tension in the air rise tenfold.

"Sorry." I whisper, immediately breaking eye contact in favor of staring at my desk, before I realize that I may have just made the situation worse.

She must be used to people staring at her scars, then quickly snapping their gaze away once they realize they've been caught. An unintentional faux pas of the worst kind.

I half-expect her to run out of her seat, or something. But after a few minutes pass, I tentatively glance back at her, making sure to look only at her eyes.

To my shock, she's staring at me, something bordering near-panic boiling in her violet irises. When we make eye contact, it only increases further. This time, I don't break the gaze. It could come back to haunt me later.

Even if she runs off now, it's not too bad. I hopefully have established myself as someone different from the general population, and maybe she'll consider that a good thing.

Why do I care?

Is it, perhaps, because in her scars -

- I see a little bit of myself?

What I could have been?

It makes me feel a little bad thinking like that.

We sit there staring at each other for a long moment. Too long. And just as I think she's going to get up and run…

She pauses. Swallows heavily. And nods at me once before turning away, slumping slightly in her seat.

…Well…

That was certainly unexpected. I'm not sure if that was her form of acceptance, or resignation - and I still don't know her name. Baby steps, I suppose.

Homeroom starts, comes, and goes. Misha and Shizune have silent conversations in their corner while sending slightly accusatory glares at me. I do my best to ignore them.

I don't feel the violet-haired girl's eyes on me for the next few hours. Then again, this doesn't exactly surprise me. Hm...Well, all things considered, it's still a start. She hasn't run away from me and panicked yet, though she was pretty close for a second.

I can only hope I don't continue to intimidate her. An unsatisfying, and dull history period passes. During the class change period, my classmate turns to look at me. I meet her gaze once more.

"W-Why...are you sitting...here?" Her voice is so soft that I'm forced to lean in to hear her, mostly because everyone else is using the few minutes we have to talk. The class is filled with the many conversations of boisterous students.

Straightforward and to the point, and utterly unexpected. Well…how do I respond to that? Why did I sit here?

"Because you seem quiet and nice…" I start. "In contrast to certain individuals…I prefer a certain level of sound…" Yeah, that's basically it.

"I...see." She doesn't appear tense anymore. It's a very good sign. In fact, it looks like she's trying to hide a smile. Sympathy?

"H-Hanako. I'm...Hanako." I start slightly at this unexpected volunteering of information. "That's a nice name." I say, without an ounce of sarcasm. It's a rather obvious way to fill the silence, I think. I'm not sure if I should now volunteer my name now...but she should already know it, right? She was here during my introduction. I'm not sure if saying mine will be awkward or not, so I don't.

She gives a faint, shy smile, nodding once before turning back. I can see her scars at this angle, though I don't think it's intentional.

Naturally, my eyes are drawn to them. I study them with a faint sense of detachment. They look like...burn scars. It looks like the tissue itself is damaged, all the way down to the wound. They're actually quite deep...

Those injuries must have been very, very painful. I hope she wasn't conscious while receiving those.

But now I'm stuck with a bit of a conundrum. Do I address her scars? Does she want me to?

Eventually, I decide to ignore it. It's her business, after all, and if she wanted to talk about it, she would. I don't think prying into her business would be appreciated, certainly not this early into our acquaintanceship.

After a second of staring, I turn back to the front, directing my attention to the science teacher that just walked in.

Mutou. Nothing interesting is going to happen in this period, I guess. Though he does have a penchant for assigning group work, from what I remember.

I wonder...

We sit through a rather dull lecture. I idly sketch a picture of the school in my science notebook, trying to draw a map of the school. It doesn't take a very long time at all, and I quickly tire of it. It's not very fun to draw rectangles, after all.

I idly glance at the girl next to me. She's dutifully paying attention, taking notes. If I had to guess, it's to avoid any looks I send her way while keeping her occupied.

I would know. It's the same thing I'm doing, after all.

Flipping a page, I try to recall the girl who almost ran into me during my exploration of the main building. Short. Blonde hair. Vibrant green eyes. My pencil slides against the sheet of paper as I do my best to bring her features to life.

She had a cute smile...Even though I glimpsed it for barely a moment, it was there. The thrill in her eyes as she ran...

Everyone has their passions, and some will work for them harder than most. How did that girl come to run on no legs, anyways? She intrigues me, that much is for certain.

There's another girl seeking my mind's attentions, though, so I mentally transfer away from the mysterious morning running girl.

I wonder what Hanako likes to do? I'm willing to assume that reading is one of her hobbies, simply based off of her character. Reading to fill the silence.

What else, though...That can't be the only thing she does. Even I could get bored, stuck with nothing else to do. There has to be something else to fill the void...

Because Hanako feels like a very lonely girl…

…Just like…