A Lot of First

First day of school.

Tristan walks through the front gates of his new high school. He puts in his translating ear pieces, turns on his phone and sees a message from Rowan, "Hope you have fun on your first day of school." Tristan responds, "Thanks, I'll try. And stay out of my room." He smiles, turns on his music, and heads to the teacher faculty office to get his class schedule. After being instructed on how to enter the faculty room, Tristan meets his homeroom teacher. He shows her his hearing aids for translating, but there was only one problem with it, he couldn't communicate back to her. So, all he did was shake or nod his head to answer her questions as best as he could. She tells him to head to his class, 2-B, and that she'll be there shortly after. Tristan walks into class, headphones on, blaring his music. Classmates stare awkwardly at him; he notices that they too can hear his music. He shamefully turns off his music but keeps in his headphones. He lowers his head to his desk with regret. Homeroom bell rings. The homeroom teacher walks in, the class stands, bows and greets her (which catches Tristan off guard), "先生おはようございます.(Good morning sensei.)" The teacher notices Tristan still sitting and has him come to the front of the class to introduces himself, "Ah…Oha... My name is Tristan Williams. I moved here around the beginning of the year from the States (looks at the teacher)." His teacher looks back at him, "はい,君にもおはよう,だね.ウィリアムズくん,どうぞ席について.(Good morning to you too, Mr. Williams. Please take your seat.)" The teacher waves Tristan to head back to his seat. As Tristan sits down back in his set he thinks to himself, "This is just peachy. I'm going to have such a good time here." His teacher calls on him again, "Mr. Williams (Tristan looks up), ウィリアムズくん,黒崎明奈さんがクラスを代表してあなたを案内してくれます.本校に通学するにあたっての注意事項は彼女から説明してもらいますので,彼女から直接聞いてくださいね. (Ms. Kurosaki Asuna is your class representative. Please meet with her and she'll explain what you need to be aware of while attending this school.)" Asuna stands and faces Tristan, "こんにちは.(Hello.)" Tristan is set back and thinks to himself, "Wow, she's pretty."

Between homeroom and their next class, Tristan walks over and sits in the empty seat next to Asuna, "Hello." Just as she responded when the teacher first introduced her, she repeated, "こんにちは." Tristan trying to make conversation, "So, when would be a good time to talk to you about everything the teacher mentioned?... I mean, do you understand me at all?" A few male students were making their way to leave the classroom. One of which "accidentally" bumped into the chair Tristan sat in, speaking nearly under his breath he utters, "ガイジン.(Outsider)" Asuna was stunned by it. Tristan, having his headphones in still translating, looks up at their direction, fully knowing what was said but not entirely sure what was meant by it. As they left the room, Tristan lowers his head between his shoulders. Asuna was puzzled and asked, "さっきあの子達がなんて言ってたかわかった?私が言ってることわかる?(You understood them? Can you understand me?)" Tristan looks up at her, still looking defeated, nods. He takes out one of his earpieces and gives it to her. He gestures for her to put it in her ear, and she questionably complies. Tristan pulls out his phone, reverses the settings, and tells her, "I heard them call me an outsider, right?" With eyes wide open, Asuna was amazed to hear Tristan words translated into Japanese. Asuna takes Tristan's phone and reverses the setting again so now it is translating Japanese to English, she asks, "一緒にランチする?(Will you meet with me at lunch?)"

Rowan hears a knock at the door, "Oh, hey Korey. Come on in. Where's Seth?" "He's at home playing his guitar. So, I thought I would drop by and see what's going on." "I'll make some tea." The two head to the living room, Korey takes a seat and Rowan goes into the kitchen. Korey turns to Rowan, "So, what's it like living with a boy?" Caught off guard, Rowan stumbles over her words, "Oh…uh…well…" Korey trying to make it easier to answer, "I mean, he's like family, right?" Rowan still flustered, "It's nothing special, and our parents are old friends. And living with a Tristan, he keeps to himself really. Typically, he keeps himself locked up in his room." Stunned, Korey presses the topic, "Oh, which room does he say in?" Korey not waiting for an answer gets up and heads out of the living room and goes upstairs. Rowan doesn't notice at first. She turns around and finds the living room empty, "Korey, where did you go?" From midway up the stairs, "I'm upstairs." "Why? What for?" "I want to see which room he's in." In a panic, "Hey, he told me not to go into his room." By the time Rowan makes it upstairs, Korey is already standing in the middle of Tristan's bedroom doorway. Korey looking through, "Oh wow. There's a lot of stuff in here." "Yeah, he's pretty talented with it too." "What do you mean?" "Well, firstly, he can play all the instruments in here." "I didn't know he was this into making music." "You have no idea." "So, you like him?" Turing completely red in the face, "What?! W-What gave you that impression?" "Row, how long have I known you? A couple of years now? I mean, I see the way you look at him during practice. If I hadn't picked up on that, I wouldn't mind being interested in him myself." "Now you're just teasing me." "So you do like him! I knew it." "Korey!" "Okay, okay… I'll drop it…for now." Rowan trying to leave the room, Korey picks up one of Tristan notebooks. As Rowan walks into the hallway, she turns to Korey, "He won't be happy if he caught you reading that." "I'm just glancing through it. Oh, wow, this is deep. Listen to this, 'The secret side of me, I never let you see/ I keep it caged but I can't control it/ So stay away from me, the beast is ugly/ I feel the rage and I just can't hold it'." "Korey, why do you do things like this?" "Wait, there's more, 'I feel it deep within, it's just beneath the skin/ I must confess that I feel like a monster/ I hate what I've become, that nightmare's just begun/ I must confess that I feel like a monster'. "Let me see that." "I thought you didn't want me to read it." "Well, there's no stopping now." With that, Rowan reads the rest of the song to herself, "Oh, my. I had no idea he had this side to himself. Please, let's keep this to ourselves." A little set back from what she read, "If you say so."

Back at school, Tristan makes his way to the cafeteria. He gets his lunch and looks for Asuna. He sees her sitting at a table by herself. Standing a few feet away, Asuna sees him, stands and motions him to sit in front of her. Feeling a little awkward about the situation, he hesitates a little to sit down, "So what is it you wanted?" Asuna looks at him a little confused. Tristan forgetting that he has both his earbuds still in pulls out his phone. Seeing that he opened the application, Asuna asks, "それ,見てもいい?(Can I see it?)" "Oh…uh…sure." Asuna plays with the application for a few moments, hands back his phone, "このボタンを押しながら話してくれたら,君が何言ってるかわかるんだよ.(When you talk, press this button so I can understand you.)" "Sure." Tristan and Asuna talk briefly about what goes on for day to day activities, greetings, clubs, and other things concerning school. The bell to return to class rings. Tristan grabs Asuna tray, "I'll take that if you don't mind." Forgetting to use his phone to translate, Tristan places his hands together then points to the tray. Asuna still not sure, watches as he takes the tray from in front of her. Asuna stands and walks over the doorway to the cafeteria and waits for Tristan. Meeting back up with her, she gives him a slight smile and starts walking back to the classroom, "これまで誰もこんなことしてくれたことないよ.(No one has ever done that for me before.)" Tristan pulls out his phone, holds down his button to translate to Japanese, "Think nothing of it." Walking in front of him she turns around slightly, pulling her hair behind her ear and gives Tristan another small smile.

​Later that afternoon, the bell rings and an announcement comes on over the PA system, "全生徒のみなさん,新入生歓迎オリエンテーションを行いますので,体育館に集まってください.そして,本日の演奏する生徒のみなさんは,体育館の前に集合してください.(All students come to the gymnasium for first-day orientation. All students performing in today's presentation please assemble outside the front of the gymnasium.)"

Tristan takes out his earbuds and makes his way to the gym. He finds Rowan, Korey, and Seth off to the side by themselves, "Hey guys! You ready to play." Seth handing over Tristan's bass, "Yeah man, I'm pumped." Korey and Rowan look at each other remembering what they read earlier that day. Rowan pulls Tristan aside, "After the concert, school's out, right?" "Yeah, what's up?" "Can we walk home together?" "Sure, I don't see why not." The four walk over to where all the other students gather that were performing. One of the teachers there explains the event schedule to them. In that, Rowan tells the other three that they will be performing last. With a smile, Seth whispers to Tristan, "That's great, they save the best for last." Tristan laughing a little too, "If you say so." All the announcements for the program were made, the first and second performances go off without a hitch. The student body was pumped up over the songs. Tristan and the others make their way onto the stage and set up for their number. After they are sure the setup is good, they meet in the middle of the stage. The four take each other's hands, Seth whispers, "Praise the Lord who is my Rock, who trains my hands for war, and my fingers skilled for battle. Amen." Before Tristan can let go of Rowan's hand, she gives him a squeeze and smiles at him. The gym starts to get a little noisier from all the students, "あいつら誰だよ!?こんなやつらこれまで見たことないよな?しかもあいつら誰も制服も着てないじゃん!(Who are they? /Have you ever seen one of them before? /None of them are wearing uniforms.)" Tristan makes his way to the mic. Remembering what Asuna told him at lunch about greetings, Tristan bows, "Thank you all. I'm Tristan Williams from class 2-B. This is my band, Beyond, and we want to perform our song 'The Resistance'." The room was dead silent. Tristan looks at the other three, gives them a nod. Rowan, "1. 2. 1, 2, 3." As they begin to play, the gym starts to get even louder little by little, more than before they started, louder than they have been during the other performances. Tristan's heart begins to race from the noise of the student body. He completely engulfs himself into his singing, feeling like he was on top of the world. Their number goes off without a hitch too. Everyone played their heart out and it showed. Tristan approaches the mic again, "Thank you so much, everyone. It was our pleasure to play for you today!" Rowan walks out from behind the drums, grabs Tristan's hand and waves Seth and Korey to do the same, they bow. As they leave the stage, Rowan forgets to let go of Tristan's hand, "Hey Row?" "Yeah?" "You going to hold my hand forever?" Now noticing it herself, she immediately let goes of his hand. Red in the face, "Sorry." "It's cool. I'm excited too." Thinking to herself, "I never want to let go of you again…W-What am I saying?!"

After that, Tristan got scolded for changing out of his uniform for the performance. He then headed to his shoe locker to leave. Rowan was standing just outside with her back to him. Before Tristan switched shoes, he snuck up behind Rowan and whispered in her ear, "Boo!" Rowan gave out a scream and started repeatedly slapping him on his arm. "Okay, okay! Stupid decision on my part." Trying to calm down, "Don't do that to me, Tristan, bout gave me a heart attack… you ready to go?" "Yeah, let me just change my shoes and we can go." As they started out, their small talk got shorter and shorter, and soon it was just silence between them. Tristan thought to himself, "This is a first. She stopped talking for the first since I've met her." At the same time, Rowan was thinking to herself, "How do I bring up his troubling lyrics without him getting mad at me?" The silence continued for the rest of their walk home. At the end of the walkway to the house, Rowan grabs Tristan's shirttail, "Hey Tristan." "Yeah?" Before he could turn around, she hugs him from behind. Confused, Tristan, "Uh?" "I'm always here if you need to talk." "What are you talking about? And can you let go of me?" "NO! I can't let go. I know we've only known each for a short period of time, so please don't get mad at me." "That depends on what you did…" "I read from another one of your notebooks today. It got me all worried about you." "Worried how?" "I don't know. Do you ever want to…uh…want to hurt yourself?" "What the he—?! Which book did read from Row!?" "I don't know which one it was, but it spoke about a monster or something." "Oh my gosh Row!" "You're not mad, are you?" "I'm really annoyed with you right now… You can let go of me already." "No. If you're mad at me, I don't want to…" "I'm not mad, I'm ready to go to bed." "Tell me about that song then." "Why?" "Because those were some heavy lyrics, and I care about you and want to know more about you. We're bandmates and friends, right?" "Yes, we're still those things…but I'm no longer in the mood to be around you at the moment… so please let go of me now." "No, I don't want to. If you promise me…" "Promise you what?" "Promise me we'll talk about this later!" Rowan began to loosen her grip around Tristan. Before she completely let go of him, he turns around still in her arms and faces her. Her fingers still locked together, she looks up at him while he's looking down at her. Tristan leans down to her face, "Promise." Rowan lets go completely and pushes Tristan away from her. She hides her face and runs inside shutting the door behind her, "That was too close. What's his deal?" From the other side of the door, Tristan speaks through the door, "You're one to talk with grabbing me like that. That's what you get! Can I come in now? I'd like to change out of this uniform."