138 Prologue, 2015 (1/2)

”I'm Ageruman Kuritina and I have transferred here from Sweden. I hope you will be friends with me.”

The rest of the class stared at the foreign girl with mouths open, just like Kyoko did herself.

That was about the worst Japanese she had ever heard, but the skinny girl had hair so blond it was almost white, so nobody expected her to speak proper Japanese in the first place. Apart from skinny she was tall as well.

Kyoko couldn't help but giggle. Two opposites. She herself was round like a ball and the foreigner looked like a flagpole. They were by a wide margin the two ugliest girls in their class, and that was enough for Kyoko to decide to try to make a friend of the new girl. They could share the misery at least.

During lunch break she approached her and was greeted with a wide, toothy grin.

”Friends? Sure, why not? Haven't had one for ages.”

That came out in an odd mix of Japanese and English, but Kyoko thought she understood most of it. Especially the part of not having a friend. With looks like theirs friends didn't come easy.

”What do you want me to call you?” Kyoko asked.

”Chri-chan,” Ageruman-san said.

”Kuri-chan?” Kyoko said, tasting the alien sounding nickname.

”Kuri-chan is fine. And you?”

”I'm Kyoko.” It wasn't more than fair to offer her first name.

”Then you'll be Ko-chan. I knew a Kyoko a long time ago, and I don't want to mix you two up.”