This story is dedicated to a very sweet but unfortunately widely over-looked and disliked pairing...

Chapter 1

I've never truly belonged among other people – even when I was young. My very first memories are of an orphanage. They said I'd been found, abandoned, by someone – they didn't remember who – and brought there. I was left with no identity, no clue as to who my parents were.

The orphanage staff called me "Masaya."

Just Masaya. No surname.

Nothing.

They said I was special – I was athletic, and very intelligent for my age. I knew I was admired by many people, but I didn't care. What I wanted was to be loved.

One day, a couple came to the orphanage, looking for a "perfect son." Before I was sure what was going on, I had a new family. And a name.

Aoyama.

Aoyama Masaya.

My new parents had wanted a perfect son, and I soon learned why: they were very demanding people. I tried my hardest to please them – to become that "perfect son" they wanted.

One day, when I was eight years old, my class took a field trip to the zoo. I had, to be perfectly honest, never actually been to one before – and the first thing I noticed was all the animals were in cages.

Perhaps I didn't express that properly.

I had always been aware that the animals would be. But it wasn't until I actually went that the fact hit me. They looked sad, trapped.

I asked my teacher why the animals were all in cages, and she explained that these animals were endangered species – creatures that were becoming extinct, and disappearing from the planet forever. Horrified, I asked her why.

"Mostly," my teacher told me, "because of us humans. Because we destroy their habitats. They're taken here to remove them from danger, so their population can grow unharmed."

"But if their habitats are gone, where will they go?"

"Who knows."

Anger flared up inside me, and I knew from that day what I wanted to do. I wanted to save these animals' habitats. I wanted to fix the environment, and eliminate the damage humans had caused it.

I wanted these animals to once again run free.

That was how I grew up – keeping my image of a perfect child for my adopted parents, resenting other humans for polluting and destroying the environment, and wondering who I was.

And other people? What did they think about me?

They saw an intelligent, kind, athletic boy. A perfect boy.

Perfect. You're perfect. That's what they all thought.

If they all want me to be perfect, then that's what I'll do. I'll be perfect.

And that's how things would have remained – I would have been nothing more than everyone's "perfect boy," while inside me my resentment towards humans slowly grew.

But then something changed.

Then I met her.

It was during my first year of junior high, about halfway through the first term. Since arriving there, I'd become some sort of idol – a boy in my class once told me his sister had started a "fan club" for me, and that it included almost half of the girls in the school. I was also the star member of the kendo club, but all these things only seemed to isolate me even further from regular people – no boy could be on equal terms with me, and with my fan club around no girl could ever become my friend. By this point, I barely cared at all.

One day, as I was walking through the school gates, a girl I recognized vaguely as someone in my class ran past me carrying a pile of books. She tripped on the concrete, and fell forward, her school books scattering everywhere. There were others around, but none seemed to be helping her as she quickly got back to her feet and began picking up the books. Almost automatically, I bent down to help her.

"Thank y–" the girl began, but then looked up at my face and silenced as she recognized me.

I glanced at the name on the book in my hand before returning it to her. It read, "Momomiya Ichigo."

"Ichigo," means "Strawberry."

That fact made me smile as I looked into her blushing face, bordered by mid-length red hair. The name fit her perfectly.

"M–Aoyama-san... kun..." Momomiya-san stuttered, taking the book I held out to her as we both got back to our feet. "Thank you."

"Ichigo, what – ?" a curly-blond haired girl, accompanied by another girl with short brown hair began to call out to Ichigo, but stopped when she saw me.

"You're welcome," I said, plastering a smile on my face. With that, I turned and left.

I heard Ichigo's friends say something to her and giggle, and Ichigo reply in a slightly dazed voice, but I couldn't make out what they were saying.

From that day on, I sometimes felt Ichigo's eyes watching me during class. I tried to find out about her, and was almost surprised at my relief that she wasn't a member of my fan club. Sometimes I noticed her among the crowds of girls who came to watch me do kendo, but she always watched from the back, and rarely jumped around, cheering, like the other girls.

Despite this, for a very long time, we made no direct contact. So you can imagine my surprise when, one day after kendo practice, she approached me nervously, blushing like she usually did whenever I saw her.

Like a strawberry, I laughed to myself.

"Hello... Aoyama-kun," she said awkwardly, a shy smile on her face.

"Momomiya-san," I said with a smile, acknowledging her.

"Aoyama-kun," Ichigo said slowly, "I was wondering... If you're not doing anything on Sunday, would you... like to go to the Red Data Animal Exhibit at the museum with me?"

I thought this site needed some more Ichigo x Masaya stories... so this is the first chapter of my first. I'm not sure how far it will continue... please review!