Yes or No

Chapter 1: New school; New Crush

Rin

I walked into my first class, English, hoping no one could tell how nervous I was. I had done so well in middle school that my school decided I should skip freshman year all together. At first I was thrilled, I've always been proud of my grades and I find learning to be a lot of fun, but now I wish I hadn't skipped. I wish I could be in the freshman class with my brother. Then I'd have someone I knew at this completely new school. He's social; I'm not. I've always leaned on my brother to get through tough situations and now I can't. No, now I'm in a room full of older students who've already figured out their friend groups and probably don't plan on adding me in. I'm nervous and scared out of my mind. I've always been with my brother. Being with him gives me confidence. Without him I'll probably fail. I'll be too worried with impressing the people around me that I'll forget to pay attention in class.

No. I'm overthinking this. Len will make some friends and introduce me to them, then I can tag along with his group and still have a social life. He's always been there for me, it's not like he'll stop now.  For today though I just need to focus on school. My top priority should be my grades. There can be nothing less than perfection.

The teacher passed some papers to each of us. He explained that these were some introductory problems so he could assess what each student needed to work on. Then, he told us the first day of class would be working on these problems and that we could work alone or with a group, whatever we prefer. I took one glance at the problems and knew it'd be simple. I finished the 30 problems in only a few minutes. I didn't want to draw attention to myself by being the first person to hand in my work, so I scanned my paper a few times and checked to see if I'd missed anything. I hoped someone else would get up first and I could follow them, but when no one did I eventually just turned in my paper and sat quietly at my desk.

I looked around the room, in an attempt to study the people around me. I wanted to try and guess who they were and everything about them so I would know how to act around them. I first noticed a boy leaning against the window with dark blue hair and eyes. His smile was almost contagious as he laughed with his friends, but he also looked withdrawn. He was talking with two girls, one with long, teal, bunny style pigtails, the other with similarly styled blonde hair in a side ponytail.

"Miku! I'm going to fail and spend my life working at McDonald's!" the blonde girl said, her head laid on the desk she was sitting at and her long hair spilled around her, hiding her face. The other girl laughed.

"You will not, Neru. Kaito, explain it to her one more time before she falls into depression, please," she said, leaning closer to him and twirling her hair.

"I'll try," the boy, Kaito, said, "but that doesn't mean she'll understand it any more than she did the last time. She really should talk to the teacher, or get herself a tutor...." Then he leaned over the desk Neru was sitting at and tried, again, to help her understand what she was doing. She sat up, listening intently, but still looked confused.

The only other person that really caught my attention was a boy sitting in the back of the room. He had pink hair and green eyes. His eyes were interesting, full of concentration, yet off in another world at the same time. I wondered what he could be thinking about. He wore big headphones and a grey sweatshirt. He seemed to be humming whatever song he was listening to as he hunched over the desk focused on his work, though he was too far away for me to hear if he really was humming. He got up to turn in his work quickly after I did. He noticed me watching and I turned away, embarrassed. Instead I looked back to see what the other three were talking about. Neru, it seemed, still didn't understand the problem. She looked very frustrated.

"I'll never get it. I just give up," she said.

"Ask Yuma, he's smart," Miku said, then she turned to the boy with the pink hair, a faint blush seemed to appear on Neru's face when Yuma was mentioned, but I could've imagined it. "Yuma! Can you help Neru? She's afraid of being stupid."