The weekend went by relatively quickly. I stayed home and relaxed, mostly because Takahashi had told me to take advantage of the last bit of free time I’d have for a while. Sana was home with me pretty much the entire time except for on Sunday, when she went to register for school at Meio Junior High with Takahashi. On both Saturday and Sunday, Takahashi challenged me to more games of USB, though he didn’t win one round; he had given me the usual “broken controller” excuse, going on about how he’d beat me next time.

Beep, beep, beep.

I woke up at six thirty to the sound of my phone’s annoyingly shrill alarm.

“Would you turn that off?” Sana groaned as she rolled over to her other side.

“You need to get up too,” I groaned through a yawn.

“I don’t want to!” She yelled into her pillow.

“Whatever, I have dibs on first shower,” I said as I stood up from my futon. My knees popped on almost every step I took to the bathroom until I stopped halfway there to stretch a bit. “Ugh, I must’ve slept in a bad position.”

I was in and out of the shower within two minutes, and dressed in my uniform after another minute. I went into the kitchen to find yet another bag of croissants sitting on the counter, right next to a sticky note from Takahashi.

I’ve gone to work already. The croissants in the bag are fair game, and there’s 1000 Yen in each of your backpacks for lunch. I’ll be home at about dinner time, so I’ll pick up takeout from somewhere. Have a good first day.

I looked inside my backpack, which he had taken out of our room, to find a 1000-Yen note folded in half tucked in one of the pockets.

“Sana, if you aren’t ready in ten minutes, I’m leaving without you!” I yelled at her.

“I’m almost ready!” She yelled back angrily; she hadn’t ever been a morning person. “What are we doing for lunch?

“Takahashi took care of that,” I explained as she walked out of our room in her new uniform. It consisted of a white button-down shirt, navy-blue skirt, and a matching navy-blue blazer that looked strikingly similar to the black one I was wearing. “Ready?”

“Yeah,” she said as she grabbed a croissant from the paper bag situated on the counter. I walked with Sana to her school, which happened to be on a similar route to Asuka.

“Have a good day. Don’t do anything stupid,” I instructed as I left her at the school’s gate.

“What makes you think I’d do something stupid?”

“Do I need to explain that?”

“That’s fair.”

I watched as she turned and walked into the school’s main building, then continued to Asuka. There must have been a fair amount of Asuka students with siblings at Meio, because I saw just as many Asuka uniforms as I did Meio ones. Three minutes later, and I arrived Asuka’s main gate. Mr. Nakamura stood there, half-awake as I walked by him.

“Oh, hey kid. Good luck today,” he said through a suppressed yawn.

“Thank you,” I said as I walked by him. “Don’t fall asleep.”

“Very funny,” he replied through another yawn.

I made my way to the main entrance, and walked into the main building. I took off my shoes and shuffled to the locker I had been assigned, stuffing my shoes inside it then locking it, dropping my slippers on the floor at the same time. I walked into my slippers, then made my way upstairs to Ms. Yamada’s classroom. First years were all on the first floor, second years all on the second floor, and third years had a separate building, attached by a shaded walkway.

“Touma, you’re here a bit early,” Ms. Yamada said from her wooden podium located at the front of the classroom. “That’s good though. Would you come with me to the teacher’s office? I need to give you your textbooks.”

“Sounds good,” I said as I followed her out of the classroom and back down to the first floor. The teacher’s office was large compared to the classroom. If I had to guess, it took up at least two and a half classrooms worth of space.

“You can sit down here,” she said, pointing at one of the two seats at her desk. “I have a couple things to tell you about; nothing too big though.”

“Okay, I’m listening,” I replied as I took a seat.

“Class 2-A is, well, special. First off, I teach all subjects for you guys, so you won’t be meeting with any of the other teachers unless I ask them for help on a specific lesson. Secondly, all of the kids in your class have some of the highest test scores in all of Japan.”

“Hold on, hold on,” I said, trying to let my brain catch up with what she’d just told me. “All of them are that smart?”

“Yes, they are. Though on the same test I gave you, the highest score was a 92 behind your 100. And that particular student finished the test in three hours, compared to your one-hour time.”

“Why did they take the same test?”

“We had to gauge scores. If you had scored lower than the 2-A average, you wouldn’t have been admitted to our school.”

“They’re probably not going to like me very much, are they? Especially since they had to take an extra test because of me.”

“No, they were happy to, actually. They didn’t have to do lecture all day and got to go home early. If anything, they’ll hate you for taking the school’s top rank for second-years.”

“Wow, that makes me feel so much better,” I said, my voice practically dripping in sarcasm.

“Don’t use that type of language with your seniors.”

“Sorry,” I said, remembering who I was talking to.

“Anyways, here are your books. If you don’t like them, too bad; that’s this year’s curriculum. We can head back up to the classroom now, class is about to start.”

“Yes ma’am,” I said as I packed the textbooks away into my bag. By the time we got back to the classroom, four of the five rows of seats were full except for one seat next to the window in the fourth row.

“Good morning class,” Ms. Yamada said cheerfully as she placed a stack of papers on her podium.

“Good morning ma’am,” everybody in the class stood up and greeted her in unison.

“This is Touma Tanaka, your new classmate,” she said, pointing a finger at me. “Touma, care to introduce yourself?”

“Sure,” I replied, “I’m Touma Tanaka. You can call me ‘Touma’ or ‘Tanaka’ or whatever else you want, I’m not a huge fan of formalities. Um, I like to read, run, and play games. I look forward to studying with all of you.”

I heard whispering from the a few of the students, but most of them stayed quiet.

“Touma, go ahead and sit next to Riku in the fourth row,” Ms. Yamada told me.

“Sounds good,” I replied as I walked to the only empty seat in the fourth row. It was next to the window, which would have been nice if the view wasn’t of the gym.

“I’m Riku Sasaki,” the guy next to me said. He had light brown hair and eyes that looked similar to mine. “I hope we can be friends!”

“I do too,” I said as I took my seat.

“Touma!” The girl in front of me whispered as she turned around. “My mom said you’re going to be working with us starting today! I can’t wait!”

“Oh! Yua, I didn’t know you were in this class,” I said. I felt my face get hotter, so I turned my face towards the window.

“Oh, I thought I’d told you I was,” she explained, still gazing at me. “Anyways, do you want to walk to Wonderland after class together?”

“I’d love to,” I replied as I regained control of my emotions, “but I have to take my sister home after school.”

“I can go with you if you want! I live really close to the shop anyways, so it’s not an inconvenience or anything.”

“OK then,”

I couldn’t tell why she was acting so friendly, and apparently Riku could tell what I was thinking because immediately after Yua turned back around to face the front of the classroom, he tapped me on the shoulder.

“What did you do to get her to talk like that? That’s the longest conversation she’s had with anybody in this class so far.”

“I ran into her at the library last week. Maybe that has something to do with it?” I theorized.

“That’d do it. She’s kind of a bookworm,” Riku sighed, leaning back in his chair.

“Don’t lean too far,” I warned.

“It’s fine, I do this every—”

Riku lost his balance and toppled backwards along with his chair.

“You were saying?” I asked, extending a hand to help him up.

“Shut up,” he said with a grin as he stood up.

“Everything OK back there?” Ms. Yamada asked from the front of the room.

“Yeah,” Riku and I responded in unison.

The rest of the day went by pretty slowly. Lecture was boring, as I’d suspected it would be, and I finished the practice problems we’d been given within twenty minutes of receiving them. For lunch, I decided to skip out on the cafeteria, opting instead to grab a granola bar and chocolate milk from the vending machines just outside the classroom.

As I finished my granola bar, I looked out the window next to me and saw Yua leaving the library; little to my surprise, she was clutching an armful of books, though I couldn’t tell which ones. The bell rang out, signaling the return to class for the rest of the students. Class continued until the final bell rang for us to either go home or to club activities.

“You ready?” Yua asked as she stood up from her desk.

“Yeah, if you are,” I replied, following her out of the classroom.

“Guys wait up!” Riku blurted from behind us. “I don’t have anything to do for the rest of the day; the other student council members wanted to take the day off. Can I hang out with you guys?”

“You’re on the student council?” I asked. I hadn’t thought about it, but Riku definitely looked like he’d be on it.

“Yep,” he explained with a grin. “I’m the president, actually. Anyways, can I come with you?”

“If you want to I guess. We’re just taking my sister home then going to Wonderland,” I told him.

“Wonderland? Isn’t that in Summit?”

“Yeah, it is.”

“Cool, I can get food there,” Riku said excitedly.

The three of us walked downstairs to our lockers and put on our shoes, then walked to Meio. Sana was already waiting for us at the gate; her expression went from bored to confused as she saw Yua and Riku walking with me.

“You actually talked to people?” Sana asked, acting as if I’d never seen another person.

“Yes. Is it that surprising?” I asked as I flicked her on the forehead.

“Ow,” she squealed.

I introduced Sana to Yua and Riku, “Yua, Riku; this is my little sister, Sana. She’s annoying, so you can ignore her.”

“Rude,” Sana mumbled.

“She’s so cute!” Yua exclaimed, pinching Sana’s cheeks.

“Is she an old lady in disguise?” I asked Riku.

“Couldn’t tell you,” he sighed. “I’m getting hungry, can we hurry this up?”

“Aren’t you the one who decided to tag along?” I recalled. “You’re right though, we might be late.”

Once we reached Takahashi’s apartment, I handed Sana my key and said to her, “Takahashi should be home soon. When he gets back, tell him I’m at work and will be back just after nine. Send me a text if you go anywhere.”

“OK,” she said as she jumped up the stairs. “See you later.”

Riku, Yua, and I started walking toward Wonderland, mostly in silence aside from the ambient sounds of the neighborhood. Suddenly, Riku spoke up.

“Touma, is it true?”

“Is what true?” I asked, confused at the question.

“That your parents were killed?”

“Ummm,” I was shocked by how nonchalantly he managed to ask ­that question.

“Riku!” Yua shouted. “Why would you ask that? Are you that tactless?”

“It’s fine, Yua,” I said with a sigh. “Yeah, it’s true.”

I explained everything that had happened to Sana and I over that last two weeks, and how we were living with Takahashi.

“That’s awful,” Yua said through choked back tears.

“Dude, I’m so sorry,” Riku apologized.

“Don’t worry about it,” I said through another sigh. “How did you know about it? It wasn’t covered on the news.”

“My dad went to high school with one of your neighbors,” Riku explained, though he didn’t say which neighbor it was.

“Are you OK?” Yua asked, drying her eyes.

“Probably not,” I said as I put my arms on top of my head. “I will be eventually, though.”

“We’re here for you if you need anything man,” Riku said as we arrived at Summit. He pointed at the café, “Do you want a croissant? My treat.”

“Sure,” I said gratefully. Even though I was sick of croissants, I didn’t think it was a good idea to turn away free food. “We’re going to go into Wonderland. When you’re done in the café just meet us in there.”

“Sounds good,” he said as he walked inside.

“You ready to train me?” I asked Yua as we walked inside the shop.

“I-it’s not like there’s much to show you,” she replied, still drying her eyes.

“Hey kids!” Mrs. Inoue greeted us.

“Hi! Thanks again for the opportunity,” I said, closing the door behind me.

“You’re still wearing your uniforms?” She asked, pointing at our attire.

“Oh! That’s what I forgot to do. Be right back!” Yua said as she ran out of the store.

“And what about you?” Mrs. Inoue asked me.

“I kind of forgot to change when we dropped off my sister,” I explained. “You must live close by if she’s going to change.”

“Yes we do. Right across the street, in fact,” she said, gesturing towards where the street was. “Tomorrow, make sure you aren’t in your school uniform. For now, take off your blazer and put this on.”

She handed me an apron similar to the one she was wearing, except this one had my name embroidered on it.

“Thanks ma’am,” I said as I took my blazer off, replacing it with the apron.

“No need for the formalities,” she said as she turned around to work again. “You can wait around until Yua gets back. She won’t be very long.”

Just then, Riku burst in the door, croissants in hand.

“Heyo!” He shouted as he entered.

“Dude! Keep it down,” I scolded. “We’re in a bookstore.”

“Oh, right. My bad,” he apologized in a hushed tone. “Here’s your croissant.”

“Thanks bro,” I said as I took the brown paper bag from his hand.

“And who might this be?” Mrs. Ioune asked.

“My name is Riku Sasaki, ma’am,” he said with a bow.

“You wouldn’t happen to be interested in a part-time job, would you?” Mrs. Ioune asked hopefully.

“Sorry,” Riku apologized, “I have student council most days, today was just weird. I appreciate the offer, though.”

“Damn,” she muttered. “Don’t worry about it, sweetie.”

“Alright, I’m back!” Yua said as she reentered the shop She had changed into a plain black skirt and a red t-shirt.

“Well, thanks for letting me come with,” Riku said to me. “I’ll see you at school.”

“Sounds good,” I replied. “Thanks again for the croissant.”

“Bye Riku!” Yua said as he left the shop. He waved back at her and closed the door on his way out.

“Yua, go ahead and show Touma how to run the register and stuff. I’m going to get some food,” Mrs. Ioune instructed.

“Okay,” Yua said as she grabbed my hand, leading me to the register. “This thing is pretty old, so you have to have a bit of patience.”

That was the biggest understatement I’d ever heard; even during her explanation, Yua would click on one button, but something else would happen instead of what she’d intended. Moreover, each basic function of the register was excessively over-engineered. In order to select a book to sell, you had to first scan the barcode of that book, then enter the code on the back of the book, and finally you had to scan the book again. Sometimes, the scanner would freak out, and you’d have to start the whole process over again.

“Why don’t you just get a new system?” I asked.

“It’s not broken, is it?”

“Well, no,” I answered.

“Then we don’t need to spend the money on a new system,” Yua explained as she led me to the storage room. “This is where we keep our extra inventory. When you take a book to put out on the shelves, just use the scanner on the wall. It’ll put it into our live inventory.”

“You seriously have something that easy for this, but you still use a register system older than me? How does that make sense?” I asked, scratching my head.

“Didn’t we already agree that the register isn’t broken?”

“Yeah,”

“So then that’s that,” she said with a smile, leading me out of the storage room. “That’s pretty much all there is to it, aside from cleaning.”

“OK, so what do we do now?”

“We just wait until someone comes in,” she explained, plopping down into the chair behind the register. “It’s a Monday though, so we probably won’t get any customers.”

“Oh, OK. Sooo, we just sit around for the next three hours?”

“Basically,” she said. “Do you have LIME?”

“I can download it,” I said, taking my phone from my pocket. Two minutes later, we had each other’s ID. I sat on the floor next to her chair and yawned. “What books do you usually read?”

I could tell how excited she was by the question because of how bright her eyes became.

An hour later, Yua finally finished telling me about all the books she’d read; which one’s she liked, which ones she didn’t, and which ones she recommended for me to read.

“What about you?” She asked, looking down at me from her chair.

“You won’t judge?”

“No.”

“I like to read slice-of-life manga,” I said shamefully.

“Really? Which ones?” She asked, seeming genuinely interested in my tastes.

“My favorite right now Horimura, but I pretty much like everything,” I explained.

“Oh, I love that one!” She exclaimed. “We actually just got the newest issue in, if you want to read it.”

“Is that OK?” I asked.

“My mom won’t care,” she said as she walked into the storage room, grabbing the newest issue.

“Speaking of your mom, shouldn’t you call her? She hasn’t come back yet,”

“She said she wanted me to close up tonight, so she won’t be back tonight. She said to tell you ‘good job on your first day,’”

“Oh OK,” I said as she sat on the floor next to me. Suddenly, I realized the situation I was in. I smacked my hands against my cheeks, telling myself to calm down.

“You OK?” Yua asked, seeing me hit myself.

“Oh, yeah. I’m great. How about you?” I asked; I instantly wanted to bury myself in a hole.

“I’m fine,” she said with a giggle. “Should we read?”

“Let’s.”

We read through various manga by the time we had to close the store. Luckily, nobody had come in during that time, so we were left uninterrupted as we read together.

“Alright, I think it’s time to close up,” Yua said, checking her phone.

“Sounds good,” I said through a yawn. “What do we do?”

“It’s easy. Just turn off the lights, put the register into sleep mode, then lock all the doors.”

“In that order?”

“Not necessarily,” she laughed, putting the register into sleep mode. We finished closing the store at exactly eight-thirty and walked to the street.

“Well, I’m going that way,” Yua said, pointing across the street.

“OK, I’ll see you in the morning,” I said as she walked across to her house. “Night!”

“Goodnight!” She said with a smile.

My walk home went by quickly. I reached the apartment and knocked on the locked door, waiting for Takahashi to open it for me.

“How was school? And work?” Takahashi asked as he opened the door.

“Great, actually,” I said as I took off my shoes. “I’m exhausted though.”

“Did you get dinner?” He asked.

“I had a croissant a few hours ago.”

“There’s a microwave ramen for you. Sana ate all of the take-out.”

“Thanks,” I started. “Wait, what?”

Takahashi laughed and pointed at a box in the garbage can.

“She ate all of that?” I asked.

“Well, two-thirds of it. I swear, I tried to stop her from eating your share,” he explained. “I was scared she was gonna bite my hand off though, so I just gave up.”

“Understandable,” I said as I opened the ramen packet on the counter.

“USB?” Takahashi asked.

“Nah, I’m just gonna eat then go to bed. Long day.”

“Suit yourself,” he said as he walked to his room, “coward.”

“What was that?”

“I said ‘good night,’” he said, shutting his door.

I ate my uncooked ramen noodles, then went to bed, falling asleep faster than I had any other day that week.