The Normal Girl at the Abnormal School

How long had Kaori and Mitsuba been standing on the front steps of her house? She’d stopped talking as soon as she had brought up the accident that killed her parents. Kaori felt her ears ringing.

“Stay with me, kiddo.” Mitsuba flicked Kaori’s forehead, bringing her back to earth. “Your aunt won’t be too thrilled if you blow up her house, too.”

“S-sorry…” Kaori rubbed the spot he flicked with her hand. He picked up on her emotional state so easily that it was unnerving.

“Were there any other incidents you can recall besides those two?” he asked. Kaori shook her head.

Mitsuba put the cigarette out on the bottom of his shoe and picked up his briefcase. “So you want to leave tonight, huh? What about saying goodbye to your friends first?”

“I don’t really have any friends,” Kaori said, shaking her head. She put her hands behind her back and kicked her feet. “Just saying goodbye to my aunt and grandma tonight will be enough for me.”

“Got it,” he said, walking to the front gate. He turned back to Kaori. “Pack up everything you want to bring, and I’ll come back in a little while to escort you to Tokyo on an overnight bus.”

Mitsuba exited through the front gate as Kaori waved goodbye to him. She went back inside the house, straight to her room, to gather her things. Even though she’d be leaving everything behind so suddenly, Kaori’s footsteps felt light like she was walking on air.

She sat in her room and looked around. A bookshelf with textbooks, study guides, and manga. A shelf with a couple of plushies. A small closet containing her school uniform and a handful of casual clothes. That was the extent of her belongings. She’d been living with her aunt and grandmother for five years, but somehow this room never quite felt like it was her own.

Kaori opened up her phone and pulled up the LIME group chat she had with those girls from school. The last message was from the week before, one day before the incident. Looking over the group chat now, Kaori realized that the three of them dominated the conversation. Her own last message was a dumb sticker.

It was only fair, given what happened, that there was radio silence on all ends. One by one, Kaori blocked each girl. And she deleted the group chat.

She flopped back on her bed and wondered if she’d be able to make friends at her new school. They’d be just like her, right?

***

“So…about her…ability…” Kaori’s aunt asked, passing a sideways glance to Kaori.

After an hour, Mitsuba had returned–this time in casual clothes–to take Kaori to Tokyo as promised. Kaori couldn’t even find it in herself to be disappointed in how readily her aunt and grandmother were letting her go.

“Ah, that,” Mitsuba chuckled. “That’s something you cannot talk about with anyone who isn’t present.”

“Mitsuba-san, you’re placing a lot of trust in my loose-lipped aunt,” Kaori mumbled. Her aunt was a notorious neighborhood gossip. You couldn’t tell her anything you didn’t want other people knowing. Even if she said she’d keep a secret, she simply wouldn’t.

“Kaori–” her aunt hissed.

“I’m saying they physically cannot talk about it,” Mitsuba chuckled. A foxy smile crept across his face as he looked at Kaori’s aunt. “It was in the paperwork that was signed and stamped. They’d known if they’d actually read it.”

“Wh-what?!” Kaori’s aunt nearly fell over.

“If you try to talk about this to others, you’ll find yourself unable to speak. If you try to write about it, you’ll find your hand unable to write out the words,” Mitsuba explained with that coy smile. “Don’t you think the world is more harmonious when people don’t know about the existence of magic?”

Kaori’s aunt stared at him with her mouth flopping open and closed like a fish. People like this are all bark and no bite, thought Mitsuba.

“Of course, we could have erased your memories of Kaori, but I don’t think she’d want that. Right?” he added, giving Kaori a wink.

Kaori sighed. He was right. Even if she felt frustrated at the moment, she didn’t want her only family left to forget about her. She still wanted a home to come back to eventually.

“Kaori-chan,” Grandmother said, taking Kaori’s hands. “Please take care of yourself out in Tokyo.”

“I will, Grandma.”

“I suppose you can’t get a part-time job while you’re at this school,” Kaori’s aunt sighed. “I’ll send you an allowance every week.”

“Thank you, Aunt.”

“I will call you when I’ve dropped off Kaori at the school in the morning,” Mitsuba said, bowing.

He took Kaori’s luggage and put it into the van for her. Kaori watched her aunt go into the house as she got in the van. Mitsuba followed and closed the door behind himself. Kaori waved goodbye to her grandmother one last time before the van took off, and her grandmother disappeared from view, followed by the house.

“I heard you don’t do well with cars,” Mitsuba said to Kaori as they wove through the tight suburban streets.

“You heard right,” Kaori said. She pulled a pair of noise-cancelling headphones and a sleep mask out of her bag. “That’s why I brought these.”

“Sensory deprivation. Interesting choice for staying grounded,” he chuckled.

“Yep. I hope you weren’t expecting me to be a good conversation partner on the trip,” Kaori said, putting the mask on like a headband.

“Do what you need to do, kiddo,” Mitsuba said, looking out the window. “I’ll let you know when we get to the bus station.”

Kaori nodded, then put the headphones over her ears. She flicked through playlists on her phone to find the loudest music, then pulled the mask over her eyes once she’d settled on something.

It wasn’t long before they reached the bus station. Mitsuba nudged Kaori to let her know they’d arrived at their transfer point. On the bus, he’d stowed away her luggage for her, checked if Kaori needed any drinks or snacks, and asked if she wanted the window seat like an attentive parent.

Kaori fell in and out of sleep during the trip. She peeked out from under her eye mask at one point to check the time, only to find Mitsuba dead asleep in the seat next to her. He kinda reminded Kaori of the social worker who helped her after she lost her parents, which was comforting.

She pulled the eye mask back down and tried to fall back asleep. So much had happened at once, Kaori couldn’t help but feel like she was dreaming.

***

The trip from Kobe to Tokyo took the entire night, landing their arrival close to seven in the morning, right in the thick of rush hour. From there, they took public transit the rest of the way to the school.

Afraid they’d get separated, she clung to Mitsuba’s shirt as he briskly moved through Shinjuku station before shuffling onto a crowded train. Kaori couldn’t help but feel her heart race watching all the different people move about with purpose during her first big city commute.

At their destination station, Kaori noticed students wearing the same uniform–navy blue blazers, blue plaid trousers and skirts–headed in the same direction as them.

“Mitsuba-san, are they students at my new school?”

“That’s right.”

Kaori loved the uniforms. She didn’t mind the uniforms at her old school, but these ones seemed so stylish with their colors and use of plaid! What struck her, though, was how normal everyone looked.

“You’re thinking about how normal they look, aren’t you?” Mitsuba teased.

Huh!?

“Are you a mind reader?” Kaori asked, trying to examine Mitsuba closely.

“Not at all,” he chuckled. “But I’ll warn you that if you let your guard down like that, you’ll be in for a shock when we get there.”

As they approached a huge campus that seemed more like a university than a private school, Kaori saw the sign “The International Academy of Interdisciplinary Studies - Tokyo Branch.” Her new school and their final destination. After passing through the gates, she couldn’t help but turn her head in all directions, taking in all the different buildings.

Kaori followed Mitsuba into the main school building. Like a normal school, there were rows of shoe cubbies and handwritten signs with slogans to encourage students. But as Kaori took in the students buzzing about the entrance, she let out a gasp.

Mitsuba was right. This place was far from normal.

Amongst the human students, Kaori saw people with horns, animal ears and tails. There were students with wings, and some with scales. Students with a whole rainbow of skin colors! And what seemed to stand out most to Kaori was…

“Elves...?”

“You have a sharp eye,” Mitsuba said. “There are all different kinds here–students and faculty.”

“And you, Mitsuba-san?”

“Me?” He had that sly, foxy smile again. “What do you think I am?”

Kaori looked closely at him and tilted her head. He was so average-looking–eerily so–like it was an intentional choice to look so unassuming.

“You’re not human, are you?” she asked.

Mitsuba simply held a finger to his lips. That was his secret.

“I’ll settle your dorm assignment for you. For now, you go meet the headmaster for an orientation.” Mitsuba looked around at the students before flagging down a boy with pointed animal ears. “Hey, young man!”

“Yes?” the boy said, stopping what he was doing and walking towards them. He was tall, with fluffy orange hair that ended in white tips. If it weren’t for those ears, he would have looked just like a normal student with a flashy haircut. Kaori couldn’t help but stare.

“This girl is a transfer student,” Mitsuba explained, gesturing to Kaori. “Could you take her to the headmaster’s office?”

The boy met Kaori’s eye and smiled at her. She flinched, realizing she was staring.

“Sure! Follow me,” he said, beckoning Kaori as he started off in the direction they needed to go.

Kaori began to follow before stopping and turning back to Mitsuba. She gave him a deep bow. “Thank you so much for everything, Mitsuba-san!”

“You’re welcome. We’ll be in touch,” he said as he waved goodbye. Mitsuba turned and headed in a different direction from the one where Kaori and the animal-eared boy were heading.

She hurried to catch up to the boy, who had stopped and waited for her when he realized she wasn’t following him.

“Thanks for waiting!”

He smiled and nodded, leading the way.

KAORI’S DIARY ENTRY:

Dear Mom and Dad,

It would seem that I have some special abilities that I need to learn how to control, so now I have to attend a special school in Tokyo for people like me. I’m nervous but excited. Maybe this means I’ll get a do-over on my high school debut…