{Chapter 3: Meeting Mikaze Ai}

So, you might wonder, why did I leave in the first place?

The only reason I attended this academy in the first place is follow my mother's footsteps, I could be taken out of the academy in a year for all I knew.

I should've prepared myself.

3 Years Ago~

"I've made it!" I found myself overwhelmingly happy upon seeing my name up on the board of people who passed the entrance exam. Guess I was kind of stressed out, I'd have to return to high school if I didn't get in, and the school had me on the do-not-take-entrance-exam list. Who wouldn't be worried?

Pushing everything aside, I was so happy! The crowd was pretty pushy despite it being so early in the morning. I see that I wasn't the only one anxious for the results. I sigh in relief with a growing smile, and pushed myself out of the crowd that was gradually growing.

I take out my phone, and was already about to dial a number, but the question is which one first?

My father's or my scout's... Hm, it makes me a bit regretful I didn't exactly talk to Camus the way I wanted to.

On the day of the entrance exam, I had planned to make at least one friend. But I ended up being alone the whole tour around the academy friend-wise. Camus and I were in the same building for the test, but we had different classrooms assigned to us unfortunately so our meeting was short.

Oh, I hope to see Camus again. Maybe this time, I can actually fulfill my goal. But he might've saw me as a little kid...

Making new friends is hard.

Maybe I can make a new friend here. Looking at the crowd of people eagerly looking at the board to look for their names, there's bound to have some people who attends the school.

But wouldn't that be weird? I mean, there's lots of people who didn't get in. As I think of that, I come to notice sounds of crying and the repetitve words of "It's okay, it's okay. Cheer Up!"

Looking for the source of the sounds, I found it surprisingly quick with the amount of people here. I place my phone back into my pocket. It'll be weird anyways if I call them at this hour. They're probably still sleeping.

Before I can make a plan, a sound of a screeching microphone goes through the air. Instinctively, I put my hands over my ears to try and block the sound. "What was that?"

It wasn't just me who heard it, people up front had it worse with the source closer to them.

"Testing, Testing." A girl's voice says loud and clear into a speaker.

And then all of a sudden, a platform from behind the fence started to lift to reveal a whole stage with a girl and boy with bright smiles on their faces and a mic in each other their hands. The two had uniforms on despite it being super cold.

"Good Morning Everyone!~" The girl starts off with, the voice was recognized as the one who was testing the microphone.

It's a good thing the school isn't very close to a neighborhood, or else, many problems would've occured. The crowd of young adults were a bit unresponsive, so the boy kind of pitched in.

"It's best to be on your best behavior,Principal Saotome is watching!" He warned, and then all of the crowd started to nod. "Yeah!~"

"My name is Ayumi, but you can call me Ayu-chan!" The girl said, quite cheerfully.

"And I'm Haruki, Haru is fine." He said calm and politely.

The girl suddenly had a strained smile as she nudged the boy from behind, I suspect it wasn't intended for the crowd to see as the boy chuckles awkwardly as he added in, "Haru-chan is okay too.."

Ahh...They look so cute... Brother and Sister? I wonder what their relationship is.

Anyways, to sum it up, they were here as representatives for the school in place of the principal who wanted to make his "grand entrance" on orientation day. And, guess what I figured out! They were already-debuted idols! They knew that not all of us made it into the school, but they still talked lovingly toward the school.

I swear, they made the crying stop. They also made a whole comedy skit out of just explaining the school. Though, the comedy soon came to an end when they had something special for us to hear.

The air became quite atmospheric as soon as they announced they had something special.

Snow began to fall from the sky as music filled the air. A piano? No... The notes were more generic than a piano's... A keyboard maybe? As expected of an academy of preforming arts, there's always a piano involved.

But sadly enough, the player didn't reveal themselves as he/she played.

It was so elegant... I closed my eyes.

But all I could imagine was beautiful snowflakes in the sky.

It was almost like the song was describing the beautiful winter without words.

When the song ended, the duo said the player was someone who had also taken the test and will be attending the school in the Spring - the time when everyone will be starting school.

I wonder if they had just taken a random student, but I figured that wouldn't be the case, the person must have something unique about themselves. I would believe it if they were just choosen because of their talent.

"He will not be showing himself because of the cold - but you can see him in the spring, look for Mikaze Ai!" Haruki announced.

Oh, the gossip already has started. Great.

But I wonder what this Mikaze is like? If he's a new student, he couldn't have debuted yet. Heh, but he can't reveal himself because of the cold? That's kinda adorable. But it's nice to know they gave out credit on his behalf.

I think this is the time to call, they must be eagerly waiting for my results.. At least one of them is bound to be excited as I am.

I separate myself from the bunch and figured it would be okay to take cover from the snow under one of the umbrellas from close by.

Now that I've come back to my senses, I was kind of shivering. I cover my mouth with my palms and blew them to keep warm.

It didn't seem I wasn't the only one. Someone had followed me out to the gates, doing the same things I was doing to keep warm.

Oh.. This is my chance. I look over to the person besides me, oh, it's a girl.

She had bright blue hair, blue eyes, and really nice pale skin. Oh, she's so pretty.

Not to offend anyone, but in my opinion, I think girls are kind of easier to talk to. Girl to girl that is. My Father has never been the easy one to talk to, and my conversations with my mom were hard to forget.

"Did you get accepted into the academy?" I tried my best to started conversation. She wasn't exactly started as I would be if a stranger talked to me. She nodded silently at my question.

"Did you make it in too?" Her voice was a bit deep, but not deep like Camus's. The more I thought about Camus's voice, the more I forgot what it sounded like.

She was wearing one of those fluffy white jackets that are extra warm, and boots to top it off. She had good taste.

"Yeah, I did...Luckily." I kept the last part to myself, I didn't want to have to go explaining all about how possibly the principal could do everything in his power to get me out of his books. From the way she was trying to do her best to keep warm, I figured she didn't like the cold very much.

"I'm Shoshui Chikako, nice to meet you." I introduced myself and outstrenched a hand to shake hers.

"Mikaze Ai." She quietly says as she stared at my hand, puzzled of what to do. But she eventually took my hand to shake it. Her hand overtook mine in size. But when I tried to my hand back, she pulled it back towards her.

...What. She had the same name of that mysterious keyboard player.

Okay, I added mysterious in by myself and proud.

Uhh.. But if I could recall, the keyboard player was a boy, Haruki had specifically said he.

Could I be mistaken?

"It's...Warm.." When he met my eyes, I came to realize that I was totally wrong. I should never trust my eyes again. It was definitely a guy I was talking to. A-And.. The one who was playing that music is definitely him.

I started to clam up, uhh, he was grabbing my hand, in the middle of the sidewalk. Is this okay?

"Oh...Look, it's a cafe." Across the street, was a warm looking cafe with people happily drinking out of teacups.

He doesn't even bother to ask me, as he pulls on my hands toward the shop.

And that's the story of how I got my first friend in this strange new environment.

It was a bit quiet, as he insisted that we'd have a cup of tea together. Every once in a while, he would touch my hand after every couple sips. He was checking if my hand was getting any more warm by the looks of it.

But he doesn't seem to care about the silence as I did, Mikaze was very observant is what I learned. That, and he's the same age as I was. He did also admit he was the one who was playing the piano.

And guess what? He got to do that small performance because Saotome thought Mikaze could appeal to people before his planned debut.

I managed to split up with him after our little tea and I called my dad first.

Unexpectedly, he was proud of me. We had a little celebration right then and there over the phone with one of us crying, and it wasn't me. Then I went to go tell my scout, who gave me a less emotional celebration with a couple of Good Jobs and how I have a long way to go.

I went back to my temporary home which I had planned to stay in with my aunt, uncle, and little cousin until I could get into one of the dorms I enlisted for, feeling more accomplished than I did when I woke up.

~Present~

"Chi.." Ai addresses upon spotting the two who were walking around, soundly enjoying themselves. An uneasy feeling forced him to open the door, interrupting the two in their own little peace.

"Chi.." He says once more, except a bit louder, but she didn't hear him. Ai took a closer look to see that they both were wearing earphones.

Ai couldn't just stand and watch, regardless. He took quick steps in the direction of Chikako.

And when he finally reached her, Ai took off Camus's earphone and swiftly placed it into his ear.

Camus, of course, noticed right away. "Ai, the hell are you doing?" He barked at Ai, which lead to alarm Chikako.

Their walk came to a stop, and Chikako looked extremely happy seeing Ai.

"Ah! It's Ai!" Chikako exclaimed. Without a word, Camus takes back his earphone from Ai, but Chikako has already taken out her earphone to hand back. As Chikako retracted her hand, Ai took it into his.

"It's still warm, Chi's Hand.." Ai whispered.

"U-Uh.."

"A-AI... GET AHOLD OF YOURSELF."