Chapter Five
Usagi leaned against the inside of the front door to her house and hugged herself around the arms, still reeling from the date she had with Mamoru. Still, even though they were engaged, Mamoru has yet to set a date yet for the two to wed. She tried not to let it bother her, but it did sometimes when she thought about it. Still! She was engaged nonetheless! And in the next little while, she promised to herself not to let Mamoru forget about it. Let alone the wedding together, just setting the date would be a good shove in the right direction.
She could be forceful… When evil is afoot. But this was a different situation, and she needed to be stealthy. And to be wife to Mamoru for a short time before the Earth supposedly would fall into slumber and to become rulers of the future crystal city, a tactful and determined Usagi would be needed. Never to mention dealing with Chibi-Usa. The little sneaky person in Usagi shall show herself soon to get what she wants.
Usagi sighed softly and smiled, going through her usual ordered routine of putting away her shoes, jacket and otherwise so she won’t be yammered at by her Mother some time later about her carelessness.
Her Mother. At least in this lifetime. She was still reeling a little bit from when she was taken back to the Moon by her past Mother those few months ago. The time seemed to pass by a little quickly since then.
So just to save herself grief later on, she would keep herself in line, surprisingly. There’s only so much of motherly nagging you can take before you give up. And she would be damned if she wouldn’t do that to her own child soon enough. She *will* have her day to dish it out instead of always taking it.
She still owed Chibi-Usa for that whole gun incident when they first met. What a first impression! At least she knew that she would grow out of that ‘bratty’ phase eventually.
Sooner or later, Usagi found herself munching on a random food item, seated in front of the television until the ring of the phone broke her concentration, and made her jump a little bit from it being so sudden. TV’s can really get her into a trance sometimes. Amongst other things.
“Hello?”
“Hey Usagi, it’s Naru.”
“Naru! What’s up?” Usagi responded, relieved to be hearing from her long time friend. Looking to the side, she saw that Luna had silently entered the room. Always a cat.
“I have the best news! At school there are a few new students who are going to be transferred! One from Korea, one from Yokohama, one from Sapporo, and one from….. I think the Philippines.” Naru reported, apparently excited over the new bit of rumors that she has been hearing from her other friends about the diverse group of students.
“What are they like?”
“The Philippines? I don’t know much about that area.” Naru said, not clued into Usagi’s question fully.
“I meant the students, Naru.” Silly Naru.
“Oh. Who knows?” Naru responded. Usagi was then expecting her to continue, but apparently not.
“Well, we’ll find out tomorrow. They’ll need someone to show them around! Who wouldn’t love our school, am I right?” Usagi thought out loud, cheerfully.
“It’s a fine enough school, Usagi. Be sure to find me before the introduction assembly. I need to be sure to get my ass over there. Times like these always make me excited. I don’t know why.” Naru said as she finished off her homework. Usagi heard the mad scratches of a pen from over the phone.
“Naru, where do you get all this information from?” Usagi wondered after years of hearing her ramble on about the latest ‘juicy gossip’.
“It’s a secret.” Naru said flatly from the other end of the phone. Usagi waited a few moments to see if she would continue after all, again she didn‘t.
“Come on, tell me!”
“Sorry, Usagi.” Usagi yawned. “Tired?”
“Yeah. I just had the -best- date with Mamoru. He’s so sweet…” Usagi daydreamed, almost forgetting that she had the receiver still stuck to her ear. She’s had just enough excitement for one day. For one life, in fact.
“I’ll see you tomorrow then, Usagi.”
“Have a good rest. You‘ll need it.”
Usagi sighed and put the phone down into it’s cradle and laughed a little to herself about her friend’s energy over a few new students. Granted it didn’t happen too often, but it was such a diverse background of students that got her interested, at least just a little. She just didn’t understand why they would come to such a small area such as Juuban.
So she ended that night on a positive note, and headed off to bed with Luna trotting right behind her, whom decided to leave the usual nagging to tomorrow. Luna herself needed to catch up on those ‘naps’ that her feline comrades so frequently are able to enjoy, and several months without any enemy or evil dropping by, she was starting to relax. At least in some respects.
It was a bright and dreary Monday morning; the beacon of light to the intellectuals, and a burden to well… Usagi. The ever-late student dragged her feet as she entered the school and passed by the front office as she did so. She remembered what Naru said to her the night previous, there were a slew of bodies in the office, and the head secretary trying to sort them all out. Usagi smiled, knowing the secretary the level of boredom and order was driving her nuts; she loved times like these.
Usagi hopped to (not literally), and headed off to class with a hurried step, and the time seemed to drag on and on, with the boredom of classes. She was going to review this over with Ami later, so at least that kept her grades up to a reasonable level. She didn’t need to worry too much about it. It was soon pointed out to Usagi that she apparently can’t pay attention, and received a lecture from one of the not-so-liked Teachers in the school about it. She timed it - 10 minutes. Someone’s going to kick her in the ass one day. She wondered if Makoto could do it.
Later on, Usagi and Ami met up in the courtyard for one of the hyper-study reviews that have begun to become a part of their daily routines. These started one day on a passing remark when Ami was over at Usagi’s house, and Ikuko mentioned that Usagi might need a little help with her studies, and who better than Ami? Of course the rest was history. They studied together wherever they could; the Crown Café, the Courtyard soon to be covered with snow, Usagi’s house, etc.
It was probably not the best place to sit down and try to review schoolwork in the aggressive winds and autumn temperatures, but it was the only place in school right now that was actually free to get some work done. Frankly, it was lunch time, and Usagi would rather concentrate to chew and swallow her lunch instead of doing that and trying to keep up with Ami at the same time. Luckily, Ami spoke Usagi’s language- a very simple, basic language with short words. Ami just loved a challenge.
Usagi straightened out her back with a tiny yawn, and shook out her hands from the scribbling fest of taking down notes from what Ami was saying to her.
“Let’s stop for a while.” Ami suggesting, as she picked up on Usagi’s hints to fatigue. There was only so much that Ami was able to teach her in one study session, but she wanted to see how much Usagi could take, and to extend that so she can learn more and more. Hopefully.
“Thank you!” Usagi exclaimed, although a little more under exaggerated than normal for her. Usagi started to use both hands now to shovel food into her mouth, and soon all would be well in Usagi-Land.
“Hey bookworms!” A voice exclaimed from afar, it was Minako as she waved one hand as she tried to balance a wad of books with the other. Somewhere else in the school, she and Naru met up and decided to give the two studiers a bit of a visit before lunch was over. Granted, Minako didn’t know Naru too well, but they did have Usagi in common, and in most instances that was enough.
“Having a good lunch?” Ami asked, finishing off some notes that she needed to elaborate more on., and more importantly for future reference.
“Yeah, sorta. Our next class needs to start 10 minutes early, so lunch will be even shorter for me.” Minako grumbled, but will explain the whole story later, she figured.
“Sorry to hear that, Minako.” Usagi sympathized.
“Did you see the office, Usagi? It’s packed!” Naru exclaimed, trying to think about something a little more uplifting.
“Oh, the secretaries there can handle it. We just get to be able to have the students after, and I’m sure the principal will miss some things. That’s where we come in.” Naru said, almost a sneaky tone to her voice.
“Just make sure to give them some oxygen now and then!” Minako said, knowing that Naru couldn’t hurt a fly…. Or at least a bee.
“I’ll be right back guys, I need to visit the ladies’ room.” Ami said politely, and started to walk away.
Usagi worked quickly to catch up with her, exclaiming: “Wait for me!” as she raced, to nearly knock Ami clear over.
Naru and Minako stayed behind to guard Usagi and Ami’s school books and papers from flying away in the chilling wind.
“Next time, I’m going to save a table for them in the library.” Minako pointed out as she watched her two friends walk, or run in this case, out of sight.
“You go to the library?” Naru thought aloud, from what she heard, Minako herself wasn’t exactly the best student either when it came to studying. At least she wasn’t as bad as Usagi, and she was probably as bad as it gets.
There were no washroom stalls vacant in any of the washrooms. Even on the hardly visited third floor bathroom, the duo were getting desperate. There was only one bathroom left, and that was nearest to the office. From what they have heard, that bathroom recently was renovated with very modern things: Western - styled toilets, new sinks, even feminine product dispensers. All the students in the school would eventually go there, but a lot of them were stuck in their routines away from that particular area, and with exams coming up, not a lot of thought was concentrated on a single bathroom.
So, it would be sooner rather than later that Usagi and Ami would check out this very new bathroom for themselves.
The two entered, and found out first hand that the word of mouth was in fact, correct. Compared to the other bathrooms however, this was far superior. The contrast alone in cleanliness and appearance, that just plain shine of it was remarkable.
“It’s beautiful.” Ami said, as she had a look around at the handlebars to the sink faucets, which turn sideways with a handlebar instead of the old flattened cone shaped ones of before.
Usagi instead, had rushed to the back of the washrooms to the line of stalls, and had a peek at the toilets; the very shiny, Western toilets of which were becoming more and more popular in Japan. She was amazed, to say the least. There was also a little bit of muted pink on the tile walling, so Usagi was pleased to see that little added touch.
“We have to bring the others here!” Usagi was brought out of her thoughts by a knock on one of the closed stalls. She had missed this one, and hadn’t noticed anyone there until now, since she was just plain excited over a bathroom.
< Just think of it; a new school bathroom getting Usagi excited. Maybe I should make the study times more interesting for her. > Ami reflected for a moment.
The knock came again, and Usagi tiptoed up to it, and rapped on the grayed metal in response.
“Uh…. Hi?” came the voice from the other side. “I’m a little short on bathroom tissue, can you help me out, please?”
Usagi rushed to get a more than generous wad of toilet paper from the stall next to them, balled it up in her tiny hand, and shoved it under the door, which was raised: something else they weren’t used to compared to before. Usagi made extra care that no square of the tissue paper touched the ground - something else forced from habit.
A surprised sound and a short ’thank you’ followed immediately after from the stall, and Usagi returned to the sink area of the washroom, and waited to see this person, as her tour of the new bathroom wasn’t quite through. She had to see EVERYTHING. Usagi and Ami might not get another chance like this again, at least in the next little while thanks to the mad studying time.
The toilet flushed, and out came a student, but one that they hadn’t seen before. If she was in this bathroom, then obviously she came from the office just now, or at least was in the general area, which none of the students usually did. She was about the same height as Ami, but looked slightly heavier than the normal body size, straight black hair with one side pulled back to the hairline with a clip, purple eyes with a blue ring on the outside, and had on the standard Juuban Gakuen uniform, but she had a black jacket on with a crest of a school that was not from this region. She quickly washed and dried her hands thoroughly, and stood in front of the two friends.
The three bowed to one another, and according to Japanese tradition, each in turn did their introductions, but only did the very basic of such, as this student probably had more things to do in the office. Saying factoids about them such as; birth date, blood type, what grade they’re in and most importantly; age.
“Your turn.” Ami encouraged. Usagi only smiled as only she could.
“My name is Kyuudou Meian, I’m 17 years old, I was born October 28th, I’m in the second year of Senior High school, and obviously I just transferred my school here from Kitami in Hokkaido. It’s nice to meet you.” the new addition now known as Meian ended with a bow. She would go into detail, but she really didn’t know when she’d meet these two again in a school so big. The other two returned the bow.
“Is it really busy in the office?” Ami asked, she would have to go down to the office herself later on in the day. She really didn’t want to face a mess. It just wasn’t Ami-like to be in chaos.
“It’s insane in there. I’m taking my time in here, actually.”
“I don’t blame you, the secretaries can really get worked up when it gets busy like that.” Usagi sympathized, then continued. “But they’re patient most of the time, which is a good thing.”
“So when should we see you in classes?” Ami asked the question so very much like her.
“Tomorrow most likely. If not then Wednesday, I don’t know how long this paperwork and scheduling will take.” Meian answered, whom dreaded to go back to that office. Stall Meian, stall, stall!
“We should get going ourselves, we left our friends in the courtyard. We’ll see you around later in the week.” Ami half - promised.
The three said their goodbyes, and left Meian in the washroom. She still didn’t want to go back to the office, but if she wanted to finish school, it was something she needed to just tough through for a while. She sighed, exiting the washroom, the thud of the large wooden door sounded behind her as she walked slowly back to the office. She made sure to take each excuse she could to go and look at something on the walls dedicated to previous graduating classes.
“Well that was uncomfortable.” Ami remarked, as she and Usagi half trotted down the hallways, and made their way back to the courtyard, and the not so forgiving weather outside.