Once upon a teenage dream | giyushino

once upon a teenage dream

But if I know you, I know what you'll do,

You'll love me at once, the way you did once

Upon a dream

They met on the first day of kindergarten, as all great friends do.

Shinobu was bouncing around, her hair tied into pigtails as she greeted all of her new classmates with a smile her sister would be proud of. She was jumping from game to game, song to song, joke to joke, making sure she spent enough time with each person for them to consider her their friend (which by kindergarten standards, meant five minutes or less) when she spotted him for the first time.

He was sitting near the cubbies and staring wide-eyed at the other kids, an odd one out in a classroom full of havoc.

She approached him without hesitation during one of her rounds, plopping down on the floor next to him.

“Hi! I’m Shinobu! What’s your name?”

He stared at her in stunned silence. “Giyuu,” he replied timidly.

“Gee-yoo,” she repeated. “I like that name. It’s easy to say. Why aren’t you playing with the others?”

“I don’t know them.”

“But you’ll never know them if you don’t talk to them! You should give it a shot.”

He shook his head.

“No? Ohh, I get it! You’re shy, aren’t you? That’s okay. We can be friends and you can play with me!”

His eyes lit up. “Really?”

“Yeah! But you should still try to get more friends.”

He pouted and looked away. “I have friends. They just go to a different school.”

“Then I’ll be your friend at this school!”

She grabbed his hand and pulled on his pinky before wrapping her own pinky around it.

“I pinky-swear that we’re going to be best friends forever and ever! If I break this promise, you can push me off the jungle gym!”

He tilted his head in confusion, fear filling his big blue eyes. “I don’t wanna do that!”

“You won’t have to, because I’m going to be the bestest best friend ever!”

Giyuu would later admit that he was absolutely terrified of her when they first met and that she really hadn’t given him much of a choice in the matter of their friendship. He’d been too afraid to reject her.

Regardless, when they looked back on it, they both knew it had been the start of something beautiful.

Shinobu never thought of herself as a troublemaker or delinquent or whatever other colourful words her teachers used to describe her. She always finished her homework and handed in assignments on time, never hesitated to ask or answer questions in class and always did fairly well on her tests but …

She had a bit of a temper problem. Which wasn’t entirely her fault! She tried to control it, but sometimes the other kids were just so annoying. That led to fights, which then led to little seven-year-old Shinobu becoming well acquainted with the school principal, her mother’s wrath and Kanae’s disappointment.

Whatever. The kids had it coming.

She could (somewhat) handle kids making fun of her and calling her names. She just called them worse names back. Her real problem was when those kids made fun of Giyuu, poor, defenceless Giyuu who would never fight them back.