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Student council duties have always been important to Jun. So, when Headmaster Sakata informed them and the rest of the student council of a new student arriving at their middle school, even if socializing wasn't exactly their biggest strength, they knew they had to at the very least greet them. When they learned that the new student was Canadian, their interest only grew.
Another Canadian, here, at their school– it was unthinkable. Finally, after all this time, they would have someone to speak to in English and be fully understood! They might even be able to communicate in French. The thought made their heart flutter. Talking in her native tongue was fine, and she often was able to talk with her dads in a French-English-Japanese pidgin language, but this was different.
The entire morning, they couldn't stop smiling; their teachers and peers remarked that they've never seen them this happy before, and Jun knew that was probably true. Wearing a smile on their face wasn't their typical way of showing happiness, but they couldn't help it. Their entire body seemed alive with excitement. Their hands shook up and down in excited fists when someone would mention the new student, they spoke almost too fast to be understood (which wasn't helped by the bits of English and French thrown in), and their body rocked back and forth in their seat.
Lunch couldn't come soon enough.
As soon as the bell rang, Jun was up from their desk and darting out of the classroom, paying no mind to the confused murmurs of their classmates. They usually hated leaving class and would linger as long as possible before heading to the courtyard to sit with their fellow student council members, but today was different. A change in routine was rare for Jun, but they were sure of this; they'd gone over the quickest route to the courtyard in their head over and over as their teacher finished their lecture.
Of course, when they got to the courtyard, they saw no new faces. Their classmates smiled and waved at them, and they nodded back, but they had no intention of talking to any of them. Not when they had a mission – and a time limit. Lunch was only so long, but it was their only time to talk to this new student, so they couldn't waste it. They frowned as they re-entered the building, finally taking a moment to adjust their uniform skirt and the bag on their shoulder that held their bento.
Where could they be? What had Headmaster Sakata told them about this new person?
They were a first year, they knew that. They could only be so many places, really. Starting with the classrooms wouldn't be a bad idea. Jun had ran so fast from the second floor to the courtyard that students were still coming out of classrooms, so it wasn't unreasonable for them to think that they could still be in their's. All they had to do was figure out which one they were in. The quickest way to do that was to check each individual one.
They found out quickly that the new student wasn't in a classroom. Nor were they in the library. Or the courtyard. Or the cafeteria.
By the time they checked any plausible location, lunch was nearly over. An overwhelming sense of defeat slowed their steps as they walked to the student council room to eat lunch with their peers, picking at the shrimp tempura rolls they usually loved. They made no attempt to keep up with the conversation of their friends. All they could wonder was where the new student was and ask themself why they couldn't find them.
The question weighed heavily on Jun's mind the entire rest of the day, distracting them from their class work and pulling their thoughts away from what their teachers tried to teach them. Any energy they felt that morning drained from them. Their foot tapped against the floor in a sluggish, anxious rhythm, their wide smile no longer pulled at their cheeks, and their fingers occupied themselves by circling around each other.
All hope of talking to them was lost, and, by the time the final bell rang, Jun had accepted that. That didn't mean they didn't nearly drag their feet as they walked down the halls– nor did it mean they didn't search for anything unfamiliar in the crowd of students trying to leave.
It wasn't until they had walked a block away from the middle school that they spotted someone they didn't recognize. They could only see the back of this person, but they were sure they didn't know them. Their uniform was the same as the one Jun wore– a purple plaid skirt, a cream-colored sweater vest, and a white short sleeve button-up. Teal, curly hair was pulled into two low pigtails and topped with a pair of purple headphones.
This was them. It had to be. Nobody else Jun knew looked like this.
Their heart pounded again. Excitement coursed through their veins. Before they could stop themself, they were running up to them.
“Excuse me!” Jun called as they ran. The person didn't turn around, they just kept walking at their steady, slow pace. They tried again, louder this time; “Excuse me!”
Still nothing. It must be the headphones. Jun never liked wearing headphones, they always seemed to distract them from the world around them. How were they supposed to pick out a tourist to talk to in a crowd of people if they couldn't hear?
As soon as they were next to the new student, they pointed to their headphones. “It's irresponsible to wear those in public. I was trying to get your attention. You're completely unaware of your surroundings like this,” they said, surprisingly neutral sounding and looking.
The person looked at them, furrowed their eyebrows and narrowed their eyes, then looked down at their hand, where they held a phone. They tapped the screen, then looked back at Jun. “What?”
Jun repeated themself.
“Oh.” A pause. “I guess.”
Jun blinked. “Are you not going to take them off?”
“No,” they replied. “I can hear you and anyone else who tries to talk to me.”
“Then why wear the headphones?”
“The city is too loud,” they complained, shrinking a little. “I can't stand it. I guess I'm used to it– I lived in Ontario– but it still sucks–”
“You lived in Ontario!” Jun repeated, voice and body lighting up suddenly. The other student blinked. “Amazing– er, incroyable.”
The new student blinked, stopping.
Jun continued in French, “One of my dads is Canadian, so we speak French around the house. I'm Jun Akagi, second year, student council's publicity manager.”
The other person nodded. They continued walking, and Jun was quick to follow. “I'm Akira St. Martin,” they introduced, first in French, then in Japanese.
“St. Martin, it's nice to meet you. You can speak in whatever language you want, by the way; I know English, too.” Jun said, switching to English to prove it. Akira nodded. “I was trying to talk to you all day. I was excited to hear you were coming here.” Their voice did not quite show that, but Akira hardly seemed bothered.
“Why's that?” Akira asked in English.
“That's why,” Jun answered, smiling again. They locked eyes with Akira. “I love talking to people who speak different languages. Tourists are so fun to speak to. So are exchange students, like you.”
“...Why's that?” xe asked again, looking at the concrete. The breaking of eye contact didn't offend Jun in the slightest.
“You get to learn a brand new way of communicating, with a brand new set of rules. Does that not excite you?”
“Not really,” Akira grumbled. “It just sounds like a lot of work to me.”
“Perhaps it is,” Jun agreed with a nod, “but it's fun. For me, anyway. What do you do for fun?”
Akira shrugged. “I don't know. Listen to music, I guess. I play games sometimes. I mostly sleep.”
Jun nodded and took a moment to think. Sleeping wasn't something you could enjoy in another language– it was universal. The other two things weren't like that, though.
“Imagine how fun it would be to learn a language and start listening to music in that language. You'd start slowly understanding the phrases and really appreciate the music,” Jun gushed.
Another shrug from Akira. “I mean, I guess. I don't really pay attention to lyrics a ton.”
“Video games would be fun in another language, too,” Jun continued, “for a similar reason. You could play a game in its original language, and you would have an elevated, raw understanding of the characters. I think. I'm not one for games, really.”
Akira snorted, smiling for the first time in the conversation. “That's a shocker,” xe mumbled.
Jun furrowed their eyebrows. “Really?” they questioned. “Do I come off like the type to enjoy games?”
“No,” Akira replied, still smiling a little. “I was being sarcastic.”
Jun blinked. Ah. Sarcasm. Their face felt hot.
Akira grimaced a little, sneaking a glance at Jun. “Don't look like that, please. I thought you'd, like, know. My bad, or whatever.”
“No, no, it's alright,” Jun reassured xim. “I'm just not good at picking up on that sort of thing.”
“Okay. Cool.”
Silence fell over the pair as they walked.
Jun was the one to break it. “Where were you today? During lunch, I mean.”
“Lunch…?” they repeated. Xe took a moment to think, then nodded. “Right, lunch. I was in the nurse's office.”
“Why? Do you feel alright?” Jun asked, frowning.
Xe cringed a little. “Yeah, I'm, like, fine. Don't get so concerned about me,” they replied. “I just needed a nap, so I slept in there. The beds aren't very soft there. Don't go there for a nap.”
Jun furrowed their eyebrows. A nap? In the nurse's office? What kind of person would skip lunch to sleep? And on uncomfortable beds, too! At least now they knew why they couldn't find xim.
“That's irresponsible, too,” Jun remarked. “I was trying to meet you at lunch, but I couldn't find you.”
“I'm glad you didn't try,” Akira grumbled. One of their hands gently stroked their purple striped tie, untucking it from their sweater vest. “I was exhausted. People have been trying to talk to me all day.”
“I'm sorry you were tired, but I can understand why people wanted to talk to you,” Jun said. “You're new. We don't have new students here very often, and we hardly ever get students that speak anything other than Japanese.”
Akira laughed a little. They looked at Jun, smiling. “I think you're the only one who's excited about the language thing.”
Jun smiled back. “Maybe.”
Another pause.
“You don't mind me talking to you, do you?” Jun asked.
Akira thought about it for a second. Then, xe shook xir head. “Nah, it's fine,” they said. “I mean, you're, like, kind of excitable and you came on, like, super strong, but you're actually kind of chill.”
“I am?” Jun asked. Their eyebrows were high on their face. Nobody had called them ‘chill’ before. Usually, it was ‘intense,’ or ‘weird,’ with a couple ‘geek's thrown in there for good measure. For once, they were at a loss for words. Their face went warm again. “I, um. Thank you. You're… chill, too.”
Akira laughed again. Jun joined them; such a casual compliment felt weird coming out of their mouth.
The two walked together until they reached a train station. Jun said they had to ride home, while Akira had to keep walking to get to their apartment. They exchanged ‘au revoir's before splitting off in their separate ways.
As Jun boarded the train and took their seat, pulling their bag on their lap, they couldn't help but think about today. It was like a roller-coaster. It started high, dipped, then went back up. All because of Akira St. Martin. They couldn't wait to talk to xim again tomorrow.