Miyako Kiyomizu's Story

The sun was shining brightly this morning, causing Miyako to cover her eyes as she exited the door of the home she shared with her mother and brother. The modest home was not as far from the school as some of her friends, so she could take her time getting to school. Looking at her wristwatch, she could see that it was almost time for her to meet her friend, Haru-chan at the school gates. Despite Haru-chan being her senpai, they made friends quickly and bonded over a mutual love of books and people.

Miyako had Kyudo practice to attend after school that day and was searching her schoolbag to make sure she had what she needed. As she searched, she remembered she had left her mizugake on her desk before leaving. Mentally berating herself, she turned around and rushed back to her home to fetch the forgotten item.

After retrieving it, she ran from the house saying another quick goodbye to her mother and made her way quickly to school. As she rushed, her mind was elsewhere, worrying that she might miss Haru-chan like she had the day before. She was not paying attention to where she was going and in her hurry, she bumped into someone on the street, also heading toward the direction of the school. The stranger was wearing headphones, and had not seemed to notice her. She turned to him, gave a him a small bow and a quick sorry and hurried on her way.

She arrived out of breath at the front gates and glanced around. Students were streaming through the gates, but she saw no sign of Haru-chan. She glanced at her watch again, thinking she might have been late after all, but saw that she was just on time. The school bells wouldn't ring for at least another ten minutes so she Miyako decided to wait for her friend.

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Katsuyo sighed as he left the last train stop. He hated using public transportation. It just felt so unclean to him and he was glad to be rid of it, at least until this afternoon where he would be using it to go home. He lived pretty far from Yousaka, but they had a pretty nice academic record and he liked that about it. The train left the station with a Whoosh! and Katsuyo climbed the subway stairs in a bit of rush. He wasn't going to be late, he was never late.

It didn't take him very long to reach the school and he was early as usual. After slipping on his uwabaki, he went in search of his friends. No doubt Hiro, at least, would be here trying to catch a peep at the girls changing. He smirked at the thought of Hiro getting caught again. It was funniest if his sister caught him in the act because she scolded him.

As he climbed the stairs her could hear the sounds of bickering and he again smirked. He looked up, and just as he expected, Hiro was being chewed out by Mira. "Caught again?" Katsuyo said brightly to him. "You should find some better peeping places." He gave Mira a nod and a smile. He was familiar with her, but not too familiar and he didn't feel like angering her just yet. As they were speaking, a guy about his age bumped into Hiro and mumbled sorry. This guy was obviously a foreigner and Katsuyo recognized him as the guy he saw getting beat up a lot in the mornings. Katsuyo never stopped it, always thinking what good what it do for him to get beat up too? Mira took a motherly approach with the stranger like she did with everyone else.

Katsuyo snapped his fingers in further recognition. "Oh, hey, you're that guy from my class. Ike-san right?" He didn't really care if this guy remembered who he was, but he was trying to appear "friendly" in front of Mira.

Yamamura woke up slowly and smiled. Today was a new day! A new day to accomplish something new, and a new day to try something new. The girl yawned, got out of her bed and walked in her bathroom. Flicking on the lights, she gasped. The sight before her was indeed horrific. She had paint all over clothes, arms and legs. She knew she shouldn't have painted yesterday, but she couldn't resist her favorite hobby. After brushing her teeth, Yamamura ran out of the bathroom and to her clock sitting on her night-stand. She began to panic, school would start in ten minutes, and she had only just woken up.

The girl didn't want to walk around all day with patches of dried paint on her, but she nor did she want to miss her meeting with Miyako-chan. Deciding she would take a bath when she came home, Yamamura quickly slipped on her school uniform and brushed her hair. Glancing at the clock again, she only had six minutes left! The girl grabbed her schoolbag, silver hoop earrings, and ran out of her bedroom into the kitchen. Yamamura put on her earrings and quickly ate her breakfast of Natto. "Bye Kaa-san!" she said running out of the house.

The girl was speed walking when she looked at her watch, there was only three minutes left until school started, and she was half way there. Yamamura knew she could make it there in time, but she would have to run extremely fast. Taking a deep breath, the brown-haired girl ran like a track-runner, dodging pedestrians along the way. She looked up and saw a familiar building they called school. Glancing at her watch, there was only a minute left. Once she reached the school grounds, she began looking for her friend. Yamamura spotted her friend from a distance, ran over to her and glomped her, almost bringing the both of them down in the process. "Yako-channnn!"