Another new classmate?

Sleep never came to Taro that night... Despite the horrendous sounds coming from the other side of the door finally ending, Taro didn't want to go back to the comfort of his bed. He was terrified of that creature and didn't know if the silence was to try and lure him out of the bathroom. What was that thing? It was the same creature from when the knocking started, so why did it only attack him now?

Taro got up and splashed his face with water. He was so tired that he tried every possible way to wake himself up. He was going to miss school, he was still too scared to leave the bathroom and Kami would be here to protect him in a few hours. He just had to wait... It wouldn't be too long.

"Taro! Where are you!" a voice calls from downstairs. Taro stayed silent... Was it a lure to get him to leave the room? Was it someone who came looking for him? Thinking quickly, Taro turned and rushed to the door to make sure that it was still locked and whoever, or whatever, was on the other side of it couldn't get to him. "What the hell happened down here? The place is a mess..." The voice continued before they made their way up the stairs.

Taro slumps down at the door, holding his head, trying his hardest not to cry. His fingers wouldn't stop shaking and eventually, the tears forced their way out as he gently sobs into his hands. The person stops at the door, pausing for a moment before knocking gently on the door.

"Taro? You in here?" they speak softly, well as softly as they possibly could as to not frighten Taro. "It's Daisuke... Can you please open the door? I've been worried sick, you've never not turned up to school before." But he got no response, Taro didn't want to say anything, especially to Daisuke. Eventually, the boy on the other side slumps to the door too. The two boys sit back to back with nothing but a door separating them. "Did I say something wrong at the cafe? I didn't mean it if I did... I'm sorry."

"N-no, it's not you. It's... well, someone broke in yesterday and I came in here." Taro informs him as everything falls silent yet again. Daisuke doesn't comment on what took place the previous night, it was none of his business. "Hey, Daisuke... You've not noticed anything weird happening since Kami showed up, have you?"

"You mean other than my accuracy with my spitwads plummeting?" They both chuckle at his comment. "But no, I haven't. Why? Is there something that I should be worried about?" He responds with sincerity.

"Nothing, I was just wondering."

"Alright, then if that's it, we should get you to school. You don't want to break your perfect attendance." Daisuke instructed, getting up and facing the door. Taro slowly raised himself to his feet, wiping the tears away from his eyes. Daisuke already knew he was a crybaby, so it didn't matter too much if he noticed the tears. Splashing his face one more time with water, Taro unlocked the door and, at last, came out of the room.

"You look like a mess, get in your uniform and I'll walk with you." Daisuke offered. Nodding, Taro closed the door to his room and got changed. The glass still laying on the floor from whatever broke into the house. He would clean it up later, it wasn't worth the trouble right now. He just got into his school clothes and went to meet Daisuke who was still waiting in the hallway for him.

The two stood in silence for a little while, Taro avoiding eye contact with his peer. Together, they make their way to the front door, where Daisuke opens the door for Taro. Stepping out into the sunlight, Taro shakes nervously as if something bad was going to happen, despite all danger being gone, at least until night came around again. Taro was certain that he wouldn't be able to sleep soundly ever again, Taro was in danger for who knows how long... It could just be that one night, or he could be fighting for his life every night for the rest of his life.

"You alright?" Daisuke asks, concerned for Taro as he stands frozen, lost in thought. He quickly jolts back to attention and turns to the dark-haired boy who stands in his doorway.

"Yeah... Just a little bit on my mind."

"That's okay, I won't pry if you don't want me to." Daisuke smiles, still not sure if they are okay with each other yet. He picks up both of their bags before stepping outside next to Taro. "You want me to carry your bag until we get to school?"

"No, you really don't need to- EUGH!" Taro is interrupted by Daisuke dropping Taro's bag onto his shoulder taking him by surprise. "Hey! You didn't need to do it so roughly!"

"Hehh..." Daisuke pants, out of breath. "I can barely carry my own bag, I'm sorry. Ha... ha..." Quickly regaining his breath, Daisuke helps Taro with his bag and together, they walk to school.

This was never a day that Taro thought would ever come. Walking to school with his rival in a friendly way instead of the usual passive-aggressiveness. It was nice, but strange the longer Taro thought about it. Did he actually become comfortable around Daisuke?

"So, what are you going to do about whatever happened to your house?" Daisuke questions. It was true that Taro couldn't live in the ruined house anymore, or he could, but he wouldn't be safe in it at all. 

"I'm not sure, I'll call my parents about it and see what we do." Taro shrugged, in the back of his mind he actually considered staying with Ren for a few nights, but he didn't want to burden him with whatever monsters were chasing him.

The two made it to the school and told the front office that they had a problem that needed sorting out at home before they could leave, which wasn't totally a lie but it wasn't exactly the truth either. Thankfully the receptionist was very understanding of their situation and marked them as present.

It turns out that they had completely missed their first class, so the boys made their way to the classroom. Taro slowly opened the door and peaked his head in and immediately all attention was on him. Taking a deep breath, he opens the door and steps inside, Daisuke following behind him.

"You're late." The teacher tells the boys. Looking more angrily at Daisuke for a reason that Taro decided wasn't worth looking into. "Go and take a seat. We have a new student in the school today, so be kind." They tell the pair, though it was more directed towards Daisuke.

"Another one?" Daisuke whispers to Taro, raising his eyebrow.

"Maybe this schools getting a good reputation now." Taro shrugged in response. "Do you think it would be a good idea to talk to them?"

"Might be a good opportunity for you, but I think I'll step out of the spotlight for a while." Daisuke chuckles to himself as they both take their seats. In sync, the boys take their bags off and take out their workbooks, placing them on the desk. 

Taro looks around the classroom for anyone that seems unfamiliar to him. They probably just don't have a similar timetable and go to different classes at different times, or maybe they had completely different timetables and they would never encounter each other. That option, Taro subconsciously preferred.

It was a girl, she had dark hair with blonde highlights on them, almost as if she had a really bad hair dying session. It looked really strange at a glance, but the longer you looked, the more sense it somehow made.

"So, are you gonna?"

"Gonna what?"

"Gonna introduce yourself?" Daisuke smiles hoping that Taro agrees to it. "If you're nervous about it I can come with you." He politely offers, knowing Taro's reserved nature would probably get in the way of him making some new friends.

"Alright, fine." Taro scowled, trying his hardest to look at least a little interested in talking to someone else he had never met before. "I'll give it a shot, but only this once. Got it?" He finished angrily. Daisuke looked excited, he did say he wanted to stay out of the spotlight, but his actions didn't reflect that very well.

"Alright cool! I'll try 'n find out who they are and we can go talk to them" he says also scanning the room for people who seem unfamiliar to him. Almost instantaneously, he managed to point out the new girl as if he was a machine built to detect people that is not on its database. "Target spotted." he says, nudging Taro.

"Can you not say that as if we're about to kill her?" He responds, gently punching Daisuke on the arm.

"Okay! Okay! I won't!" Daisuke laughs but is quickly cut off as he looks over Taro's shoulder. "We better get to work, we're getting the death stare from the teacher." Taro turns back, and sure enough, the teacher has their eyes glued to them as if they had committed the worst crime that humanity has ever seen. This unnerved him a little bit, so he put down his head and decided to start working.

Taro didn't exactly know what he needed to be working on, so he ended up doodling in his notebook for the majority of the lesson. None of them were very good, but he remembered the monster from last night and decided to quickly doodle it too, tearing it out of the notebook and shoving it into his pocket. He had to show Kami what he saw last night, this was too important and if anyone knew anything about it, it would be her.

The bell rang and class ended. Taro got up from his desk packed his bag and made his way to the door until Daisuke grabbed his shoulder.

"Weren't we going to introduce ourselves to the new girl?"

"Oh, right. I forgot about that." Taro lied, not wanting to talk to anybody new for the rest of his life. "I guess you can lead the way." He managed a slight smile which in turn put a big grin on Daisuke's face.

Daisuke and Taro greet the new girl, who is still packing her stuff away. She appeared just slightly taller than Taro but if he stood on his toes he could probably be taller than her. She had purple eyes which matched her dark hair. Taro decided to hang back as Daisuke makes the first move.

"Hey, welcome! Sorry we weren't on time to meet you at the start of the day." He has his hand held out, offering a handshake to the girl, who looks a little confused but decides to go along with it anyway.

"Hi, thank you, and it's fine." She responds, coldly. He might have just not given her the greeting she was looking for or maybe she just didn't care enough. Taro comes out from behind Daisuke to welcome her as well.

"Hi, I'm Taro." He says, keeping as far away from her as he possibly can while still being able to be heard at a talking distance. "It's nice to meet you." He says with a shy smile on his face. Daisuke knew this was an uncomfortable situation that he had put Taro in but he thought that talking like this would probably help him make friends in the future.

The girl seemed intrigued by Taro, she glanced at him up and down as if scanning him for something. She must have either thought he was okay or found what she was looking for because she looked Taro in the eyes.

"Hi, Taro! I'm Yami!" She smiled as if her attitude completely changed. Daisuke stood there, absolutely stunned. Did Taro's reserved nature work in his favour? "Thanks for the warm welcome! I hope we can talk more and become friends." Something about this attitude change struck Taro as odd, but she probably had her mind more on packing while Daisuke was talking.

"Yeah! Sounds great!" Daisuke responded for Taro. "Do you want to sit together in the cafeteria and we can chat at lunch?" He suggested suddenly. This launched Taro into flee mode, he did not want to spend another second with him nor Yami. He would rather be with Kami, who he knew and felt comfortable around.

"A-Actually I have something to do during lunch. Sorry." Taro sighed. Daisuke looked at Taro, completely shocked, why was he passing up this opportunity? Daisuke didn't understand. Taro ended up edging away from the conversation and slipped out the door.

Running down the hall Taro eventually found Kami filling her locker with notebooks. She turns around to see Taro, who looks tired and as if he's on the verge of tears. Kami swiftly reaches the boy and holds him in a quick embrace, making sure that he is alright.

"Taro! Oh my goodness, what happened to you!" She exclaims, shocked that Taro appeared at school looking as rugged as he did. Kami checked him up and down, looking for any wounds on him, she didn't know what to expect but physically, he was fine.

Taro rubs his eyes before reaching into his pocket to grab the doodle that he made during the class. "This thing showed up last night and broke into the house." He explains, handing her the crudely drawn monster. "It kept on tapping on the window, and when I went to check behind the curtain... That's what I saw." He continued as calmly as he possibly could. Kami examined the picture and Taro saw her expression change from a kind smile to absolute terror.

She hands the doodle back to Taro and turns back to her locker, closing it, and looking down to her feet. "Hey, Taro. Do you know how people normally say things will get worse before they get better?" Her voice wavers, unable to look Taro in the eyes. "Well... things are about to get  a whole lot worse."

Taro was expecting that, but it still shocked him nonetheless. But whatever was after him might not have been aware that Taro was alone last night. What if Taro wasn't the target of the attack? 

Taro started fidgeting with his clothes. "Hey Kami..." He quietly says. "Do you think that I'm in danger? I-I mean life-threatening danger." He stammers, struggling to get his thoughts out into words. 

Kami freezes for a moment, turning back around. "Well... It could be nothing... But I don't want to take that risk. Especially when it's you that's in trouble." She looks Taro in the eyes, placing her hand on his cheek. "I won't let anything happen to you. I promise."

Taro smiles. Kami really thinks highly of him and would do anything to make sure that he's safe from danger. "Thank you. It means a lot that you're looking out for me, I'm lucky to have someone like you." He whispers just loud enough so that she can hear him.

The bell rings, starting the next class. Luckily Taro and Kami shared the same classes for the rest of the day, so he didn't have to worry about anything other than losing focus which would be completely on him. "Oh, one last thing." Taro says, getting completely serious again. "I need to avoid a social situation, can we go somewhere during lunch?" he asks in a less serious tone. "I told Daisuke I was busy and now I need something to keep me occupied."

"Well, maybe we could go to the library." Kami answers as the two walk to the classroom, side by side. "It might be a nice place to relax and I've heard it's relatively empty."

Taro gleams at Kami's idea. "Yeah! That sounds nice." He had been wanting to get his hands on a good book for a while now, so that suggestion made him smile. "We'll pick up some food from the cafeteria and make our way there then!" he concludes before opening the door to the classroom.

The teacher writes on the board as everybody gets settled into the class. Taro places his Textbook on the table and flips his notes to an empty page. Daisuke appears to have taken his seat next to Yami, who still seems to be trying to ignore him.

Daisuke taps on Taro's shoulder "Are you sure you don't want to come and hang out with me and Yami?" he asks with his hand still on Taro's shoulder. "She's pretty cool and totally wants to be your friend." Those words hit Taro where it hurt the most: His emotions.

Taro looks at Kami for a brief moment before turning back to Daisuke. "Look, I really can't hang out. I'm really busy right now, maybe some other time." He stresses, feeling slightly guilty about lying to him. "It's just that Kami and I have stuff to do, and it's really important."

A smirk creeps across Daisuke's face. "Is that so? You should have told me, sorry for bothering you then." He says winking at Taro. "Have fun you two."

"Uhh... Thanks?" Taro replies, not knowing if they are completely on the same page about what 'important' means. Taro decided that it wasn't worth worrying about and turned back to the front of the class and started paying attention to what was going on.

Time seemed to fly by, Taro managed to finish any work he was given as quickly as he possibly could and ended up doodling in his notebook to pass the remaining time. He wasn't completely fond of drawing, but he enjoyed getting what was in his head down on paper in a visual representation.

The bell rang once again, dismissing the class. Each person rises from their desk, packing everything back into their bags just as they do every day. Taro finishes packing and starts making his way to the door.

Daisuke stops him before he can leave, turning taro to face him. "Look, I'm gonna ask one more time, just giving you one last opportunity you know-"

"I really can't."

"... I see... That's fine." Daisuke says, a little upset at the outcome. "Well, I hope whatever you and Kami do is better than where I'm going." his voice begins to trail off as he leaves to room. This makes Taro feel slightly guilty, but he isn't going to change his mind.

Kami grasps his hand in hers, taking Taro by surprise. "Well... That was something else." she says out loud, likely not actually meaning to. The two stand in silence for a little bit before doing anything.

"Well... The, uh, cafe... You want anything?" Taro stumbles, sounding slightly distressed. "I was just going to grab snacks."

"Don't you want lunch?"

"Not hungry enough." He responds. "We can decide when we get there I suppose." Kami nods and the two leave the classroom to make their way to the dining area. The two never drop each other's hands, which ends up making people stare at them.

They collect their food from the cafeteria and just as they are leaving, Taro spots Daisuke and Yami, who appear to be talking despite being infrequent and very awkward looking.

Glad I missed out on that Taro thinks to himself as they leave to make their way to the library. The walk there was quick and once the two got into the room they immediately went for the giant beanbags.

"This was a good call." Kami says, slumping down into the seat letting out a sigh of relief. Taro mimics this and becomes completely relaxed. "Glad I suggested this." She laughs, smiling at Taro, who looks like he's about to fall asleep.

"Yup, I'm glad we came here." He says, opening the snacks for them to share. This was exactly what he was needing. The previous night was starting to feel like a distant memory despite it still needing to be dealt with.

Kami picks up the chocolate bar and takes a huge chunk out of it, placing it back down on the table. Taro looks over at her with a concerned expression.

"You know you're supposed to snap pieces off and eat them, right?"

"Mmmhm." She replies with her mouth still full of chocolate. "You want some?" She says as she holds out the bar to Taro who is completely repulsed by the action.

"Not anymore, no." He declines, turning his attention away from the crime against all sweets that has been presented to him, and instead starts looking for a book that he could probably read later. None of the books particularly interested him, a lot of the books seemed like they wouldn't be too fun to read. However, one did catch his eye.

Taro grabs the book off of the shelf and starts reading the synopsis with Kami loudly eating in the background. The book appeared to be about teaching people how to be better at being trustworthy. Taro puts the book back on the shelf, not finding the topic interesting at all.

"Find anything interesting yet?" Kami asks, finishing off her chocolate bar. "I saw you looking at that book, did you not like what you saw?" She comments, pointing out that he put the book back onto the shelf.

"It just wasn't that interesting. I'm more of a fiction kind of person, you know." He said, smiling. He enjoyed books where he could go on adventures and pretend he was with the characters. He enjoyed immersive stories like that. Taro gets up off the cushion and walks over to the fiction section and immediately picks one out, and with a quick glimpse at the synopsis, he instantly knew what book he was taking out.

Taro flips it open and begins reading as Kami starts looking for one herself. Taro's fingers glide between the pages as his eyes scan each page. He enjoyed reading a lot and wished that he had more time to do it, but school was proving to be working him really hard so he didn't have much time to do so.

Taro smiles softly as he turns each page, it reminds him of when he was much younger. He used to read books like these before going to bed. It was a time when he didn't need to worry about what people thought about him, but now everything changed and he can't go back to how things once were, he understood that perfectly clear.

Kami finally returned with her book in hand, sat down on the beanbag and flipped the book open. The two sat next to each other and just read their books, letting time pass by until their next classes.  Taro glances over to Kami's book, which appears to be about local myths and legends.

"I didn't know you'd be interested in our local legends."

"Aha! Yup, It's a little embarrassing pastime of mine, looking into different places' stories." Kami responds to Taro with genuine interest, holding the book closer to her chest. "I like knowing what people claim to have seen. I'd love to see one of those places at some point."

"But I thought you could just go anywhere considering you're an angel and such. So couldn't you see one now if you wanted?"

"No, unfortunately not. I'm currently bound to you, and even if we were no longer together, I would quickly be selected to help someone else." She says, shaking her head. "I'm usually selected for pretty serious things, not that I'm not enjoying being with you." Kami smiles sadly, placing the book on her lap. Taro places his hand on hers. 

"Well let's take a look at one of these places, I know some off the top of my head." Taro thinks about some of the rumoured places that he knows of. "There's an abandoned hospital that's rumoured to have ghosts in them, maybe we could check that out sometime?"

"That would actually be really sweet of you." Kami blushed in response to his invitation, although the redness from her cheeks quickly faded. "Are you sure you want to though? With everything going on, the last thing I want to do is strain you."

"It's okay!" Taro smiles in response as the bell begins to ring, signalling for the next class to begin. Getting up to place their books back on their respective shelves, Taro turns back to Kami. "I'll be fine. Besides, I need something to get me out of the house."

Kami smiles in response as Taro holds her hand. The two walk together, hand in hand to their next class. The two of them walk along the corridor, not caring whether people are staring at them or not.

Taro and Kami get to class, take their seats and unpack just as they do every day for every class. Taro leans over to Kami with his eyes aimed at Yami.

"What do you think of the new girl?" Taro asks. "I think she's a little strange, she talks to me and Daisuke differently." He whispers so that Yami is unable to overhear the conversation. Although she seems to be chatting with Daisuke still, although very infrequently.

"Yami? She's been acting really weird since she got here." Kami answers looking over at the girl too. "She suddenly does seem really clingy to Daisuke though, or maybe the other way around and she can't get rid of him."

"It could be both, though." Taro concludes as the teacher walks into the room and starts giving the lesson to the class. As the lesson is going on, Yami whispers something to Daisuke causing him to turn around and meet eyes with Taro before turning back to continue talking to Yami.

"They're talking about me."

"Absolutely." Kami agreed as they both start taking notes from the teacher, who is trying their hardest not to listen to Yami or Daisuke. The class continues as normal and after a seemingly long lesson, the class ends.

As per routine, everybody packs their things away and prepares for leaving the building. Kami and Taro chat, as do Yami and Daisuke. Both of the groups exchange glances at one another before eventually and inevitably converging into one group.

The conversation starts off being really awkward. They discuss schoolwork and their other fellow classmates, suggesting to Yami who they might get along with and who they might prefer to avoid. Although Yami's eyes are glued to Taro the whole time.

"C-can you quit staring at me like that..." Taro blushes, hiding behind Kami slightly.

"Sorry darling, didn't mean to make you uncomfortable." she responds. "You don't think I'm being too forward with him, do you?" she asks, turning to Daisuke. He takes a moment, looking at Taro who is still silently standing behind Kami, gently tugging on her blazer.

"Maybe just a little bit. You'd be best to rein it in when getting to know people." Daisuke answers, trying his hardest to understand how Taro feels about the whole situation. "I get you're tryna be nice 'n all, but not everyone likes that."

"Also it's rude to stare at people, did nobody teach you that?" Kami scoffed in an attempt to defend Taro.

"T-That too." Daisuke concluded, taking a step back as if Yami was about to hit him. The sight of this made Kami sick to her stomach, although Taro and Daisuke didn't seem to fully comprehend what was going on. The two girls stood across from each other as if a fight was going to break out if either of them said anything.

"We're going home now..." Taro announces, tugging on Kami's blazer. He didn't want anything to escalate further than it already has, the tension in the room is thick and nobody wanted to be there any longer than necessary. Kami looks over her shoulder to meet her eyes with Taro's before letting out a sigh.

"Yeah, I suppose Taro's right. We should be going." Kami sneers, grabbing Taro's hand and dragging him to the exit as he waves back at Daisuke. Daisuke turns back to Yami, staring at her with sorry eyes.

"I'd best be going too, I think." he whimpers, taking a few steps back away from Yami and towards the door. "I'll see you later." he runs to catch up with Taro and Kami, leaving Yami all alone in the classroom.

The silence in the room surrounds Yami, her first day in the school was pretty good. Although she couldn't get her grasp on Taro. She thinks about this, staring at her shoes. Why couldn't she make Taro fall for her? He was just another mortal, a foolish human, right?

"DAMN IT!"

Yami slams her fist into the table, leaving a dent in it. She runs her fingers through her hair, trying to think of a way of getting Taro on her good side. Pacing around the room, she ponders this.

She stops.

"I think... I have an idea." she smirks, tossing herself onto a chair in the room. "That girl... Kami, she's the one delaying my plans. Get rid of her, and I should be okay." the silence that once was in the room is now replaced with a burst of maniacal laughter.

***

"Alright mom, sorry about the house." Taro apologises, holding the phone to his ear with his shoulder. "Yeah, I'll be staying at Rens until you get back." Taro, Kami, and Daisuke as a group walk along the street, passing by each building. "Alright, love you too... Bye." Taro hangs up.

"So? What'd she say?" Daisuke asks.

"She's okay with me staying with Ren. Are you sure you want to see him, y'know, after what he did."

"I need to. My apology might not mean anything to him, but I need that closure." Daisuke smiles, undoing his tie and tossing it in his backpack. Taro smiles in response.

"That's really nice of you. Thanks." The three finally get to the house and walk up to the door.

Knock, Knock.