Hope's Peak's 78th class had some (comparatively) normal students. At a first glance, Chihiro Fujisaki would appear to be one of them. She excelled in class, and she could program. Those were her two unique features. Of course, they would be, if she was actually a "she". Since Chihiro happened to be a boy, he had all sorts of problems that came with pretending to be a girl. Girls, for one, were one of those problems. Boys too, but for a whole different reason.

A few days ago, Hina had come to him with an offering of friendship. Chihiro liked Hina, he honestly did, but he noticed how she was specifically going after all the girls in the class with the same offer. This made him think that she didn't want to be friends with a boy. Sure, he could have acted normal, after all, he wasn't planning on revealing his gender any time soon, but he would have felt bad about taking advantage of Hina like that, and she got the hint, so it's OK, right? That was what he wanted to think, but seeing Hina and Sakura laughing together- well Hina was laughing, Sakura's face just twitched up a bit- made him feel a little regretful. He had just felt weird about it because he knew she was looking for girls to hang out with so he kinda just...blanked.

These have been the sorts of thoughts running through his head ever since he enrolled in Hope's Peak. If he tried to make friends with girls, he would feel awkward about it because he's a boy, and if he tried to make friends with boys, he knew they would feel awkward about it because they would think he's a girl. The idea of a guy and a girl having a one-on-one relationship and not liking each other wasn't something common, and no matter what Chihiro did, it would lead to that sort of situation. Sure, he could try to talk to Makoto or Hifumi because they had been getting along pretty well with Sayaka and Celeste respectively, but what if they actually were more than friends? Like, what if the two of them just looked like guys who could make friends with girls and were actually going out with them? Then Chihiro would look like he were trying to get in between them.

It was with this train of negative thinking that Chihiro was walking through the deserted hall, tears welling up in his eyes from his own thoughts. Not seeing where he going as he was trying to stop himself from crying, he accidentally crashed into another person. Which caused Chihiro to fall onto to the ground from the sheer size of the person he had ran into.

"Aww damn! Hey, watch where the hell you're going!" The person who yelled this was Mondo Oowada, who had also not been looking up because he was glaring at worksheet in his hand.

"I-i I'm sorry!" Chihiro choked out this line, and promptly started to cry. He felt as if he had just isolated himself from another one of his classmates without even trying, and was beginning to wonder if he should just go back to home school with his dad because he just couldn't seem to stop people from-

"Shit! Uh, please don't cry. Look, it's all my fault so please just stop crying okay? Damn, I must look like such an ass."

"No, I wasn't looking where I was going and I walked into you! I'm sorry!" Tears start flowing from his face even harder after this. He knows it's a stupid thing to get so upset over, but Mondo just sounded so mad and the stress of everything else made it so Chihiro just couldn't make them stop.

At this, Mondo just stops for a second and stares at the crying boy in front of him. After a moment's hesitation, he reaches out his hand. "Here, get up."

Not wanting to make him any angrier, Chihiro grabs his hand because of the forcefulness of his voice. "Thank you." As Chihiro gets up, he notices the look on Mondo's face, and responds with another murmured apology.

Finally taking in the personality of the person in front of him, Mondo just sighs. "Look kid, it's not you. I just bombed a math thing so I'm kinda pissed off right now, alright?"

"Oh, what's the problem?" Shyness forgotten as curiosity gets the better of him. After all, if he could him out, maybe he could make up for the whole falling thing.

"Just this damn equation worksheet. God, I hate geometry."

"I see the problem. You multiplied pi before squaring the radius. You only got so many wrong answers because it was a consistent mistake."

"Ah, really? Well that was pretty fucking dumb. Thanks anyway kid."

"No problem." Chihiro smiles at this. At least he isn't mad anymore.

"Say, I was just making a cafeteria run. Do you wanna, uh, hang with me? You know, as thanks and an apology for making you freak out like that."

"No! Um, I mean…Yes to the cafeteria part, but no, it's not your fault!" He hangs his head down. "I was about to cry anyway."

Mondo stops for a moment, then suddenly looks enraged. "What kinda prick would make a chick like you cry? Where is he? I'll break his fucking arm! I can't stand guys that would make a girl cry!"

Before even listening to Chihiro's response, he was running down the hallway Chihiro came from. Unfortunately, the only other person in that hallway happened to be the Ultimate Chef. Needless to say, Chihiro would've tried to stop Mondo from grabbing him and hanging him on the coat rack, but once he started flirting with Mondo, he realized it was a lost cause.

A/N: This chapter was so long, so why does it feel so bad? I mean, I walked into the chapter confidently, but then Mondo had to start talking, and my writing went all downhill from there. I mean, I liked Chihiro's monologue, but since I had no idea how to continue the conversation from here, I just decided to punish Teruteru for it. Sorry bro, but Mondo ACTUALLY comforting him the day they talked for the first time was just not happening.