Auntie Kimie looked at Himeko. "You've hardly said a thing
since you came home, and you haven't eaten much. Are you
sick?"
"Huh? Uh, no." Himeko pushed around the food on her plate.
Usually she liked to eat noodles and soup, but she wasn't
hungry at all.
"How was school?" Kimie asked. "Did everything go well?
How about science club? You always have fun there." She
smiled.
"Sure. It went. . .nice. I had a great time. Hindono-
sensei gave us Christmas presents." She brandished her bag
of candy.
"How nice!" Kimie smiled. "That's good. I have a class
to
teach this evening. . .some sort of emergency, the other
teachers told me. So, I'll get home kind of late. Can
you
take care of things?"
"I don't see why not," Himeko said with a shrug. "There's
no juku tonight."
"Good. Itte kimasu!" Kimie stood from the table and picked
up several papers. She turned around and went downstairs.
"And eat that food!"
"Ja ne, O-baa-san," Himeko called. She heard the front
door closing. Rubbing her tired eyes, she wondered if the
acid fumes had done any damage. Thank goodness for
eyewear. Glancing at the food, she sighed and tried to eat
some of it. It tasted good, but Himeko didn't notice.
As soon as she'd eaten enough so that Kimie wouldn't
complain, Himeko went upstairs to her room. She took off
her sailor fuku, got out a nightgown, and went to take a
shower.
She turned on the water, adjusted it, and stepped in.
Drawing the curtain shut, she sat as warm, soothing water
poured over her. Closing her eyes, she tried to relax.
Usually a shower or a bath could do wonders for stress.
Himeko spend ten minutes shampooing and conditioning her
hair, and then she rinsed off and went out of the room, as
a cold night breeze blew. Shivering slightly, she put on
the dress. Her hair fell, brushing almost to her waist.
She found a hairbrush and considered brushing her hair, but
decided against it. After brushing her teeth and locking
the doors--Kimie had a duplicate key--Himeko went to bed.
Her room was simple and somewhat western. She had a twin-
sized bed with blue sheets. Her curtains were made of
white lace. The walls had a collection of anime and manga
posters, and one wall had awards and trophies from her
academic achievements. She had several filled bookshelves,
a white desk, and a closet. The floor was covered with a
soft cream-colored rug.
She hung up her uniform by her closet, and got into bed
with her schoolwork. She'd finished some of it before
dinner, but there was a lot left. Himeko liked to do her
homework in bed, since it was nice and comfortable. She
turned on the light and got to work.
"The integral is. . ."
Himeko threw the book down on her bed. She usually liked
math, and she was good at it. Something was wrong with
her. She looked at the page again.
"The depth of x is. . ."
She stared at the page. Depth? What? She blinked.
"Right. That's how I do it." She started writing the
problem down and solving it. This was no sweat. It
was a
review chapter, and on something that she'd mastered
years ago. She frowned. The answer didn't look right.
Reaching for her calculator, she discovered a careless
error.
"I can't think tonight," Himeko groaned. "I'm going to be
up till all hours doing this stuff." She took out her
chemistry book instead. She glanced into her bag and
pulled it out. Then she peered in again. Something
was
missing.
"Oh, darn it, I left. . .I left that book at Furinkan," she
thought with a sigh. "Ah, well, it wasn't a textbook or
anything. Just a manga. . .I can live without it." She
tried to focus on the chemistry.
"Na. . .sodium. I. . .indium? No. . .iridium.
Himeko,
you idiot. What's wrong with you?" she slapped her own
forehead.
Ranma.
"No, Radium! Argh!"
"No! Stop thinking about him!" Himeko commanded out loud.
It wasn't working. She thought of whether she'd see him
again. After all, he didn't go to science club, and Minato
wasn't in the vicinity. Himeko swallowed. Even
if they
met again, he probably wasn't going to appreciate the fact
that she'd dreamed about him, a *lot*, over the past week.
Besides, who else was there to think about? One aunt, two
friends, no one else. She wanted to call someone, but Rie
and Amaiko were both out of town.
And there was nobody else in her life. Himeko rolled her
eyes and sighed. Why, oh why, couldn't she ever make
friends?
Why did she bother to ask? She knew. People saw her
as a
girl who spent all her time studying because she had
nothing better to do. She went to school early and read
books, so people said she showed off. She was shy and
reserved, so people called her stuck-up. She always tried
to please other people, but it never seemed to work.
Looking at the clock, she sighed. Only seven-thirty.
***
"Here you go, Ranma," Nabiki said. She passed the bowl of
teriyaki over to him.
"Thanks," he said. He picked up a piece of the meat and
looked at it closely.
"What's wrong with you?" Akane inquired. "It's perfectly
good teriyaki. Eat it. I didn't make it, if that makes
you feel any better." She smirked.
Ranma ate it.
"Did you know that skeletal muscles are made of two types
of fibers? They're called 'actin' and 'myecin'. When
muscles contract, they do because the fibers slide over
each other. That's how you move your bones. The muscles
are attached at two points, the 'point of insertion' and
the 'point of origin'."
There was silence.
"You. . .what?" Genma asked his son. "Where did you pick
up this kind of stuff?"
"That was back in chapter two," Akane thought. Before she
had a chance to say anything, Ranma spoke up again.
"The process of transcription from DNA to proteins goes
like this: DNA to mRNA to tRNA to anticodons to proteins."
"That's this week's topic," Akane thought. Aloud, she
asked, "Ranma, what did you do, read the whole bio book?"
Ranma stared at his bowl. "Um. . .it got real interesting,
especially when it started describing the reticular
activation--"
"Whoa. That's enough," Akane said. "I'm impressed."
Ranma stayed silent. "I still have to read the chemistry
book."
Akane rolled her eyes. "What's gotten into you? Finally
realized that school is important, haven't you?"
"Ah, yeah, that's right."
"Good! You want to study together?" Akane asked with a
smile. Ranma would have jumped a foot were it not for his
kneeling position. "Um, yeah! Sure! Sounds great!"
He
fiddled with his chopsticks. Akane didn't notice, for she
was busy eating again.
"I'm done," Ranma said. He pushed back his bowl and jumped
up from his cushion. Akane was still eating. "What's
gotten into him?" She muttered. Sighing, she decided to
finish eating before investigating what was going on.
Ranma went to his room and pulled out his chemistry text.
After Himeko's crack about re-reading his book, he'd taken
her seriously. He couldn't figure out whether he read it
because of her insinuation that he didn't know anything, or
because he wanted to impress her--or perhaps both. After
all, she had seemed very interested in science. He figured
that it couldn't hurt to see just what fascinated her so
much. He'd spent the walk home reading his biology book,
and barely made it in tome for dinner. He would have read
the chemistry book first, but he'd left it at home.
The stuff was actually. . .well, interesting. At first, it
was really boring. But then it started talking about how
cells were like a human being, with organelles. Then he
started getting into it. The current chapter was genetics,
which Ranma had some trouble with, but it wasn't so bad
either. He had read through the entire textbook during his
walk home.
He couldn't believe it. He hated school, and he hated
science. Why the heck was he reading a dumb old book about
biology?
"Because Himeko likes it," something whispered in his head.
He'd called her Himeko-san for some reason. She was nice,
after all, and he wanted to make friends with her. Kami-
sama knew he had few friends already. She'd looked so
surprised and pleased all at once.
They had carried on a conversation successfully. They had
talked. Both of them had said things. They had agreed.
They had not fought.
Life was full of surprises.
Akane went upstairs to find Ranma staring at his chemistry
text. She tapped him on the shoulder. She laughed.
"You
don't have to push yourself so much in one day, you know.
But you're sure a fast reader." She admitted. "How'd you
get through so much of the bio book?"
"I dunno," he said evasively. "Anyhow, what didja want to
study?"
"This." Akane pulled out her math book. "We've got a test
tomorrow."
"Oh, no." Ranma groaned inwardly.
"Oh, yes. This stuff is hard. We need to study."
"Spare me." Ranma pulled out his book. "What chapter
again?"
Akane flipped it open to the right page. "All right,
Ranma, let's see if you can pass the test tomorrow."
"Not a chance," he joked. "I hate this stuff, or have you
forgotten?"
"You could at least try!"
"What if I don't wanna?"
Akane glared at him. "Are we going to study, or are we
going to argue?"
Ranma held his tongue. "All right, let's studyyyyyy!"
"Okay," Akane said. "Here's problem one. . ."
Ranma rubbed his head. "What does that mean?" He pointed
to a term.
"That was the first lesson," Akane groaned.
"I know," Ranma said.
"Forget about passing. . ."