Yu Yu Hakusho Fan Fiction ❯ Curious Powers ❯ Introducing Lavena ( Chapter 1 )

Chapter One: Introducing Lavena

 

Kurama sat tiredly in his desk waiting for his dreary history teacher to start his lecture on the Meiji Era. Personally, Kurama didn't mind history, or the Meiji Era, but Mr. Pike excelled at turning new and interesting subjects into boring and tedious topics. Quite honestly, it amazed Kurama that anyone was able to do this, but apparently it was possible. It didn't help that the sixteen year old demon in disguise had gotten back to Japan from Hanging Neck Island at three a.m. earlier that morning. The Dark Tournament while short like most demonic competitions, was tiring, especially for the winners, who usually had to fight through the rest of the contestants to live long enough to claim their prize. More then anything else, Kurama would love to have stayed at home and gotten caught up on his rest, but another absence would have made his mother suspicious. So there he was, sitting wearily in his desk on Wednesday morning as the teacher finally decided to grace the class with his presence.

“Good morning class.” The middle aged balding man said in his dull, monotone of a voice. “Today we have a new student joining us from America. I trust all of you will help her adjust to life here in Japan, and….Emi.” Kurama looked up to see Mr. Pike point to one of his students two rows in front of him. “Why don't you show Miss…?” He looked at the new girl.

“Lavena,” She said promptly. “Lavena Skylark.”

“Why don't you show Miss Skylark around and help her if she has any trouble?” Kurama realized that he was staring as the new American girl dressed in the red sailor style school uniform moved to take her seat.

Lavena was roughly five foot four with brownish red hair that fell midway down her back. Her uniform, he noticed, made the red in her hair shine radiantly. She stared at him with her hazel eyes, wondering why this boy was staring at her so intently. She knew she looked stupid in the blinding red uniform that made her look like she was cosplaying as Sailor Mars; she didn't need him to point it out by staring at her, thank you oh so much.

“Please sit down Miss Skylark.” The teacher told her dully from behind his desk. Lavena sat down in the only available desk in between a girl with short, black hair and brown eyes and another girl with longer, blonde hair and grey eyes. The blonde leaned over and whispered to her.

“Hi, I'm Emi. It's nice to meet you Lavena.” She held out her hand to Lavena, who shook it.

“Hi. It's nice to meet you too.” Lavena said politely.

Emi pointed to the black haired girl on Lavena's other side. “That's Mitsuko. She can actually stay awake in this class. If you need any notes ask her, but if you need to know anything else, just ask me.” Mitsuko nodded when she was introduced and shook Lavena's hand as well.

“Hello.” She said in English politely.

“Hi.” Lavena said.

“Ladies!” Mr. Pike shouted (which was actually an amazing feet for the very grey man) from the front of the classroom. “You can get to know each other later. Now please pay attention.” All three girls sat up and glued their eyes to their teacher.

Kurama watched Emi and Mitsuko introduce them selves to Lavena. She looked…fascinating. Not frog dissection fascinating, like in biology class, but more like, like, like he didn't know what kind of fascinating yet. However, he planned to find out.

 

*******

 

“And this is your locker,” Emi said cheerfully as she finished showing Lavena around. “Right next to mine and Mitsuko's. You can ask us if you need anything.” Lavena nodded silently as she followed the cheerful and outgoing Emi. The quieter and more observant Mitsuko walked next to her friend.

“What class do you have next Lavena?” Mitsuko asked politely as she opened her locker and got her things together.

“English.” Lavena answered absentmindedly as she stared off behind her shoulder.

Neither Emi not Mitsuko seemed to notice Lavena's lack of attention. “Well,” Mitsuko continued to say. “You shouldn't have any trouble with that class. Maybe you can help Em-“

“Hey Emi?” Lavena interrupted whatever Mitsuko was about to say. “Who's that guy with the red hair that keeps staring at us?”

Emi turned around to see who she was talking about. When she did, she squeaked and excitedly turned to Mitsuko.

“Oh my gosh Mitsuko, look who's looking Lavena's way. It's Shuichi Minamino!”

Mitsuko's eyebrows shot up and she turned around to see for herself. Shuichi was still watching them. When he saw the girls looking his way, he smiled and then turned back to whatever he was doing.

“You are so lucky.” Emi said cheerfully with just a hint of envy. “Shuichi Minamino is the cutest guy in school.”

“Not to mention the smartest.” Mitsuko whispered from Lavena's other side, making Emi laugh.

“Why am I not surprised that that is why you like him?” Mitsuko just shrugged and closed her locker. She leaned back against the metal wall and looked over at Lavena.

“I can show you where your English class is if you like.” She offered kindly.

“Thanks. That would be a big help.” Lavena answered somberly and followed Mitsuko down the hall.

`How miserable.' She thought as she sat in class, listening to the teacher talk about verbs. `I have to move halfway across the world just because Mom can't bear it any more in Houston. She didn't even ask me if I wanted to come here.' She stopped herself with a yawn. `Darn this time difference too. Why can't the whole world just follow the same time standard and be done with it? We should get rid of daylight savings time while were at it too.' She yawned again, drawing her teacher's attention.

“I'm sorry.” Lavena said in the midst of another huge yawn. “I'm not used to the time change yet.”

“As long as you pay attention and yawn silently, I don't mind.” The teacher said, and then returned to her lesson. Lavena let her mind drift until the end of class, then she somehow managed to find her way to her math class without anyone else's help. Math was dull too, but then again, math always was. During the lunch break afterwards, she was amazed she had learned absorbed really, anything in math at all.

“Oh, what a day.” She said picking at her lunch. “And it's not even over yet.” She sighed and continued to waste her lunch period. She heard a chair scrape and a person thump into it across from her.

“Hello.”

Lavena looked up from her thoroughly mixed up food into the dark green eyes of her red-headed watcher.

Lavena really wasn't in a good mood and she hadn't been all day. All she wanted was for this person to leave her alone. She wondered if he knew English very well.

“Hello.” She said in her Texas accented English.

“I suppose it would be more comfortable for you to speak in English. Although you might want to be just as comfortable with your Japanese if you want to talk to anyone else.” He said in perfect English.

`Well that blows that evil scheme out of the water.' She thought nastily to herself.

“Do you like soup?” He asked randomly out of the blue.

Lavena stared at him moodily. “What?” She did little to hide the testiness in her voice when she spoke.

He pointed to her mixed up mess of a lunch that, at this point, did closely resemble soup.

Lavena dropped her chopsticks in disgust and put her head on the table.

“I want to scream.” The words came muffled out of her mouth before she could stop them. She didn't realize she had actually spoken until her visitor answered her.

“Please don't. I think our teacher would have you thrown into a mental ward if you did.”

“Great.” Lavena sighed, ruffling her bangs with her breath. “Maybe that's were I'm suppose to be.”

He looked down into her eyes as she peered up through her arms. “Really? You don't have that crazy look in your eye that I've heard of.”

Emi and Mitsuko were right, he was cute.

“I'm Shuichi Minamino.” He said then was silent. It took Lavena a moment to realize that he was waiting for her to introduce herself.

“Oh, I'm Lavena Skylark.” She finally said taking the hand he offered.

“It's nice to meet you Lavena. Where in the United States are you from?”

Lavena decided to sit up. “Houston, Texas.”

A slightly awkward silence fell as Lavena sat and stared at Shuichi.

Finally, she broke the silence. “Are you stalking me?” She asked bluntly, causing Shuichi to give her a startled look.

“What?”

“You keep following me. So, are you stalking me?” She said with a completely straight face.

“No,” Shuichi said firmly. “I'm not stalking you.”

“Then why have you been looking at me all the time?” She leaned back in her chair and crossed her arms over her chest.

Shuichi was quiet for a moment, unsure of what to say to that. Somewhere in the back of his head, Kurama was glad that none of friends could see him speechless like this.

“Well,” He started off as Lavena continued to stare at him. Where in the world had his words gone?

“You're strange.” Lavena spoke up before he could answer her first question. Kurama looked up from where he had been staring at the table to see that Lavena had a small amused smile on her face. He took this to be a good thing.

“You might not want to let any one else hear that, you'll ruin my reputation.” It took her a moment to realize that that had been a joke.

“Yes, I've heard of your reputation, mainly from the school's female population.” She adopted a higher pitched voice. “Like, oh my gosh, Shuichi is soooo cute. He's like, adorable. Hee hee hee.” Kurama couldn't help laughing at her impression.

“The only sad thing is that it's true. I wouldn't be surprised if they formed their own fan club soon.” Kurama said, only half joking.

Lavena gave him a weird look. “What makes you think they haven't already? Some girl has already asked me three times if I would like to join the Shuichi Fan Club.” She rolled her eyes for added affect and Kurama laughed. Then he realized that Lavena wasn't.

“Are you serious?” He asked incredulously, leaning forward a little.

Lavena nodded. “Yeah, she was kinda insistent, in a scary kind of way.”

Kurama was curious. How long had this been going on? And who was it that started it? “Do you know who it was that asked you?” He asked and saw that Lavena was no longer smiling.

“What, you wanna shake her hand?” She asked before he could inquire as to what was wrong.

Kurama was slightly taken aback. Did she really think that he wanted a bunch of stupid girls gaping at him all day? They were nothing but annoying. Unfortunately, before he could tell her that though, the bell rang and she stalked off to her next class.

Well, that went well. Kurama thought sarcastically to himself as he slowly got up and walked in the other direction to his own class.

 

*******

 

Lavena plopped down heavily down into her chair as the rest of the class began coming in. She was mad, not only at Shuichi, but herself as well. Actually, she was madder at herself then him. After all, she wasn't even a nobody, she was just a somebody. Why in the world would a smart and good-looking guy like Shuichi Minamino be interested in a average and boring girl like her when he had the entire female population of the school worshipping the very ground he walked on?

The answer: he wouldn't be. It was as simple as that.