Welcome, friend, to my first fanfic!

For the record I'll be writing this as if the story took place in a slightly more Western culture, since I'm not versed in many Japanese customs. I highly respect Japan and its heritage, I just can't do it justice. So without any further ado, I hope you enjoy the first chapter of Kiss Me, Make Me Better. -Mismatch

Disclaimer: I do not own Yu-Gi-Oh, an airplane, and/or a can of hairspray.

This journal is so new, I feel bad having to bend the binding just to open it!

Hello there, my name's Sara. Sara Kaiba, at your service. But don't mistake a name for a person, I'm not just "a Kaiba". Seto and I may be twins, but it's only fraternal; we look almost nothing alike. He's just a brunette, while my red hair gives me super powers!...not really, though. Some of our credibility as human beings might be restored if we could fly and lift cars with our pinkies and turn invisible though...but what should appearances matter anyway?

I'm kind of an odd person, but I guess every teenager thinks that about themselves. I'm an often barefoot, vegany/vegetarian-ish type person, and I try to be healthy, so I end up having a rather slim figure like my older brother. (But I'll probably end up eating a bunch of junk food when I get to Japan, traveling always does that to me). I don't wear make-up anymore because I'm trying to be a stronger woman and not hide behind a "mask", but it's hard to not feel insecure sometimes. It's as if every girl wears make-up these days...

On the womanly topic, I've been informed that Domino High's uniform requires that I wear a skirt...oh bother. I dislike wearing clothing that constricts the body too much, so sometimes when I have to wear dresses or skirts, I secretly wear shorts underneath.

I consider myself pretty lucky. I've always felt as if some force in the universe has been looking out for me, and making sure things aren't so bad. I mean, life hasn't been the greatest so far, being an orphan and getting shipped off to live in a strange country without my brothers and not having a whole lot of money and getting bullied at school because I'm too awesome to be normal and whatnot, but at least I'm not dead yet!

...Man, I suck at selling myself. I've got to stop being so self-degrading.

I love being out in nature. It's like going home to millions of years and saying "Thank you for giving me the chance to enjoy life as a being of the Earth." I have a deep-rooted affinity for the feeling of the sun shining, the wind tickling, the Earth between my toes as I journey across forever and all the sensational wonders of this blessed place.

I have an interest in a great many things, so much that it is silly to even fathom writing them all down. I adore people-watching, the diversity of language, adventures, reading, singing and dancing through life, enlightenment, the arts, peculiarities, revolutions, imagining, and of course: love. Pure love; irresponsible love; best-friend love; forbidden, angsty, desperate love; love of a thing, idea, activity, word, place, color, or sound; and love of the Earth and all her inhabitants.

And regardless of my worries, I am sure of this: I am a beautiful, strong, independent woman, no matter what my fears tell me, because I am certain that we are all beautiful. When I land in Japan, I'll be sure to be the true Sara Kaiba, and not be so insecure all the time; I have such respect for everyone, I should at least have some respect for myself. I've always thought that life was about finding yourself, but maybe transferring to this new school will be my opportunity to not only find myself, but create myself, too.

I bet people won't believe I'm a Kaiba. I mean, I'm a little introverted, but I immediately open up once people make an effort to get to know me. I hope my friends are glad they made the effort to befriend me...sometimes in private they try to remind me that I'm wonderful just the way I am, but I'm not too sure about that. I mean, I'm fairly certain that I'm at least a little fun to be around, and I like to think that I have some moral fiber.

Never mind, who cares what people think? I try to be a good person, and that's all that should matter. I like to believe I'm funny, since I choose to laugh at life's silliness. Even though most of my humor comes from being quirky, I still end up making people laugh. That's all I've ever really wanted in life, anyway. I just want to make people happy. That might be my mission in life, to learn as many smiles as I can, and to hear the beautiful chorus of laughter as often as possible. I think it's a nice goal. And of course to make everything an adventure, why let the mundane tasks of life pass by mindlessly when there are inanimate objects to breath life into or silly things to laugh about? Isn't that right, Journal?

I can't wait to hear Seto and Mokuba laugh. I haven't seen them in ages. I love them, I always have, and even after all these years I've never stopped thinking about them. I was left by myself at the orphanage when Gozaburo adopted them, that is until our grandfather's friend Ray took me in. Ray changed my last name to Kaiba (with my consent, of course) when he adopted me, thinking it would be a nice bond to share with my brothers, so that I would always feel connected to them, no matter where we were. And it worked, we lived on opposite sides of the globe, but I never once doubted that they were thinking about me just as much as I was thinking about them. So even though I never was Gozaburo's daughter, I'm a Kaiba anyway, and always will be. After all this time Ray came to realize that I belong with my brothers and decided to do something about it. He tried to see if Gozaburo would take me in, only to find out that he's out of the picture, and that Seto and Mokuba have been living by themselves all this time! I'm going to miss Ray terribly, but I can't wait to reunite with my brothers. It's like a piece of my heart has been stitched back together.

My hand's starting to cramp up...not too bad of an introduction. So that's a snippet of who I am, Journal. Who are you? You know, I think I'll name you Jo: Jo the Journal. So long for now, Jo! See you after we land in Japan!

~Sara

The plane rumbled as it landed on the strip, signaling our arrival, and my mind began to swim. This isn't a dream. I'm actually going to see my brothers, and this time nothing's going to separate us. I'm finally home.

"We're actually in Japan...Hey, Jo, we're here." I whispered to my journal like a nutcase. Jo the Journal was quickly developing a presence in my life. I unbuckled the seatbelt and grabbed my carry-on bag so that I was ready to descend from the plane. All I could think about was seeing my brothers, and hoping they would recognize me after all this time. My hair's a lot shorter, and I have a few more freckles than I did at the orphanage...they better not forget what their only sister looks like.

After a few, short-lived "thank-you"s and "good-bye"s directed towards the pilot and flight attendants, I skipped through the dimly lit tunnel and into the main building of the airport. I felt lost the moment we were released into the sea of people, all hurrying to someplace important. For a few minutes I started walking in what I thought was the right direction of baggage claim, until I felt immobilized by something wrapping around my body.

"Sara! I missed you so much!" Mokuba exclaimed. I hurriedly dropped all my things and hugged him tightly, kissing him on the forehead and ruffling his mass of hair.

"I've missed you too, Mokie!" I greeted. When I got out of the Mokuba specialty hug, I spotted Seto walking towards us calmly.

"Hey, it's good to see you, Sara." Seto stated with an attempt at a smile. I immediately ran towards him jumped onto his torso, giddy with excitement. He stumbled backwards but didn't react otherwise, probably because he was too shell-shocked to know what was going on, until he slowly put his arms around my back. After a minute of me laughing from elation at finally seeing my brothers, I kissed the top of Seto's head and dropped back down to the ground. I pulled away and was about to speak, but got cut off by Mokuba hugging me again.

"I can't believe you're really here: in Japan!" Mokuba shouted.

"You cut your hair." Seto stated, as if I hadn't noticed. "Looks nice." He offered, trying to cover his Sir Points-Out-The-Obvious-A-Lot comment.

"Thanks, Seto. So how have you guys been lately?" I asked, still being entrapped by Mokuba's arms.

"Alright, a little stressed from work and stuff." Seto replied vaguely as he crossed his arms and shrugged his shoulders. We all continued the journey to baggage claim, or at least we would have, but a certain someone was still clinging onto my body, making it nigh impossible for me to move without limping like a fool.

"I missed you so much, Mokie, but we have to go now, so we can go do lots of fun, exciting things! Unless you'd rather us spend the rest of the day in this smelly place." I said, ruffling his hair again. He giggled, finally releasing his death grip and beginning to walk towards our destination. Seto and I followed suit, and I realized there was going to be a lot of catching up to do. It's been years since the three of us were all together, but I'm here to stay, and I'm sure there will be many more years to come where we can all be with each other, just like this.

Once my bags had completed their adventurous ride on the exciting baggage claim carousal, Seto swiftly hoisted them up over the bar and set them on the ground with a short "I'll help you with these." for an explanation.

I would like to note that on most occasions I try to assert my independent woman-ness by graciously declining the offer and doing the work myself, but that plane ride really got to me. My legs already felt like jelly, who knows what two more suitcases would do...

"Thank you, Seto. I really appreciate it." I replied gratefully. "So, how do we get out of the airport?" I directed the question at Seto, knowing that Mokuba was probably too caught-up in the whole "She's actually here!" thing to answer.

"Over this way." He replied as he began walking towards an area of the enormous building. The click-click-click sound of the suitcases rolling over every single tile in the whole freaking airport was drowned out when someone spoke, so I decided to initiate conversation.

"How long has Gozaburo been gone?" I inquired, hoping he would fill some holes in my memory.

"A couple years now." He stated briefly as he looked down, obviously trying to avoid eye contact. As I waited for him to continue I heard a voice address us.

"Ah, man, it's Kaiba. But who's she?" A guy with blonde hair and what sounded like a Brooklyn accent wondered, blatantly pointing in our direction.

"Oh, great. What's he doing here?" Seto grumbled, his eyebrows furrowing.

"You know him?" I asked. The evident distain in his voice clearly gave away his answer, though, so there really wasn't much point in me asking.

"Yeah, he goes to Domino High, too. He's a revolting, disgusting buffoon who doesn't know when to shut up." Seto snarled. I flinched from his harshness. Those two must have some serious history together. Much to Seto's dismay Blondie started running to our location.

"Hey there! Joey Wheeler here! But I don't need to explain myself, you've probably heard of me." He stated confidently. I tried to suppress the urge to laugh, who the hell was this guy?

"I'm sorry. I just arrived here in the country and I don't really know a lot about what's popular here anymore, so no, I haven't heard of you. But I'm sure you're a great person." I tried to be as nice as I could. I smiled, hoping not to offend him.

"No one's heard of him." Seto clarified. Joey sulked.

"Hey, you're not going out with Kaiba are you?" He asked incredulously as he glared at Seto. I couldn't contain myself anymore and let out a laugh.

"No, of course not! We're-" I began to explain as a group of people our age with strange hair arrived. Either they knew someone in the conversation or I had forgotten that everyone in Japan had no personal bubbles.

"If you're not with Kaiba, then would you go out with me?" Joey interrupted, looking hopeful. Although I was flattered, I couldn't help but giggle at the expressions of the group behind him who anime sweat-dropped.

"As if I would let my sister date a dog like you." Seto stated, crossing his arms and smirking at what he thought would be Joey's imminent reaction.

"Who said anything about your sister?" Joey asked as he scratched his head. Seto sighed in frustration as Mokuba and I laughed.

"I guess you can't teach an old dog new tricks." Seto retorted calmly.

"Is that a yes or a no?" Joey questioned. His confusion only made me laugh more.

"Joey, I think that's a no." Said one of the posse, clapping him on the back. I looked behind him to see that-

Joey has some really hot friends.

But, I think everyone's beautiful, so I guess that's not saying much...

"Come on, Sara, I don't want you to be around these people." Seto stated as he turned to walk away, the suitcases making that really annoying clicking noise until I grabbed his arm to get his attention.

"At least let me introduce myself, Seto." I requested. He sighed in defeat.

"Fine, I'll be over there." He said as he motioned towards the exit. "C'mon, Mokuba. Let's go." Seto started walking away with Mokuba trailing behind. I turned to the group of people to introduce myself.

"Hello there, my name's Sara Kaiba. I just got back from the U.S. It's lovely to meet you all." I smiled, holding out my hand for someone to shake.

"Joey Wheeler's the name!" Joey exclaimed loudly as he shook my hand vigorously.

"So I've heard." I replied politely as the others chuckled.

"But before you said you'd never heard of me?" Joey questioned in confusion as everybody sweat-dropped...again. In his stupor, someone hip-checked Joey out of the way and gently took my hand.

"It's an honor to meet an angel as stunning as you, Sara." He gushed, bringing my hand to his lips for a soft kiss. Who the hell were these people? "My name's Duke." He grinned, showcasing his bright white teeth, creating a rather heavy contrast to his dark, tied-back hair and his...eyeliner? Now that I thought about it, the majority of these people looked somewhat extraordinary. I wouldn't be surprised if their morning beauty routines took hours to complete. Trying to hide the fact that my cheeks were heating up, I smiled in relief when Duke was shoved out of the way by another companion of his.

"Knock it off, Duke, she doesn't need to be traumatized the minute she lands in the country. Hi there, I'm Tea!" The girl finally directed her attention towards me. She had brown hair that looked almost normal, not quite fitting in with the ridiculousness of the others. "Are you going to Domino High, too?" She questioned with enthusiasm.

"I think so. That's where my brother goes, and I'd like to have at least one friend while I'm there." I answered with a smile.

"That's great! We do, too! Now you'll have even more friends!" She replied, a little too thrilled with this conversation. And did she just justify that sharing ten seconds of dialogue constituted people as friends? Well, if it means less people will pick on me, I'm game!

Tea moved off to the side to let someone else through, and her eyes followed the most incredible hair of all: the king of the crazy hair people.

"Nice to meet you, Sara. I'm Yami." The crazy hair king stated, looking directly into my eyes. The way he commanded the attention of Tea and now myself was so powerful that it was almost frightening. As we shook hands I noticed how similar he looked to one of the other boys. Maybe they're brothers? They have almost the exact same, out-of-this-world hair. But he's so little, what's he doing with a bunch of older kids? Wait, am I still holding his hand?

I looked down to see that I was indeed still holding Yami's hand, so I tried to discreetly brush it off and pretend like nothing had happened. It wasn't my fault, their hair is just so weird! How do they get it to do that?

"Hi, Sara! I'm Yugi! It's really nice to meet you!" The little boy with the same insane hair beyond belief greeted, shaking my hand. Finally, someone who's shorter than me besides Mokuba! I couldn't help but smile, he was so adorable! As he let go of my hand I tried to think of the names of those I had just met, but I was already starting to forget. The blonde's Joey, the ladies' man started with a D, the girl was named after a beverage...

"Hey, Sara, I'm Tristan, nice to meet you." A guy with hair resembling a rhino's horn introduced, clasping my hand tightly. What great people these all are, regardless of how much time they spend doing their hair in the morning.

"And I'm Bakura, it's lovely to meet you, Sara." A boy with shaggy, white hair spoke: in a British accent! Man that's cool! His voice, besides being laced with British awesomeness, had some kind of warm gentleness to it. With that kind-hearted nature and that hair he could effectively pass for a woman, if he ever needed to. Not that he would, I'm not implying anything sketchy, it's just a nice skill to have...

I smiled widely, trying to look like I was actually paying attention. "It's very nice meeting-"

"Heeeey, is Kaiba your brother?" Joey interrupted.

"No, I'm just Mokuba's sister." I quipped.

"Oh, okay." Joey looked down to the ground. Everyone immediately started to laugh at him, and I got the feeling that this happens a lot. Already forgetting half of their names, I decided I should make my leave as quickly as possible so I can write down what little I still remember. I mean, really, I just met seven people, and for the record my brain is still somewhere off in jet-lagged la-la land.

"Well, I'll see you guys later, nice meeting you all!" I waved, still laughing as I started walking towards Seto and Mokuba. The crazy hair group uttered a chorus of "See ya"s and "Bye"s. I sighed with content, smiling to myself. It's good to be back. But man, if I'm going to hang out with those people, I'm going to have to style my hair differently. It's not nearly abnormal enough to be a part of their gang!